High Artist Spotlight: Vibhas Virwani
Vibhas Virwani is an Indian visual artist. He has explored both Traditional and Digital media. Lately, his weapon of choice for visual communication is digital media. He tends to use both 2D and/or 3D techniques to create digital art and animations.He has a bachelors degree in Computer science & engineering that gives him a strong technical foundation (understanding of OOPs concepts), an edge to learn new software and support creative production. An MA degree in game art and animation from the University of Abertay Dundee (2010-2012), Scotland, gave him a fantastic big-picture of the entire process of game-development and animation as well! He has an insatiable passion for Art, Animation and CGI for visual communication and exploring a variety of styles, mediums and techniques.
We recently caught up with Vibes after High Art 2022 to learn more about his most recent inspirations:
Where do you find your creative inspiration?
Nature and other artists.
Why do you do what you do?
Fiction is a way of abstraction commonly used by artists, writers and other visionaries as it reveals, very subtly, what journeying into a person’s mind might be like. I like to explore fiction visually because it gets the cog wheels running as I board whole new trains of thought. Fiction has the ability to take you away from the troubles of the real world as you get immersed in it. The practice of Delving visually in and out of the worlds of fiction gives one the ability to consciously choose the domain of their own thoughts, i.e. the practice of "Sadhana". Since our time in this life is finite, I want to make it count and use the power of fiction/thought towards creativity.
Fiction is a way of abstraction commonly used by artists, writers and other visionaries as it reveals, very subtly, what journeying into a person’s mind might be like. I like to explore fiction visually because it gets the cog wheels running as I board whole new trains of thought. Fiction has the ability to take you away from the troubles of the real world as you get immersed in it. The practice of Delving visually in and out of the worlds of fiction gives one the ability to consciously choose the domain of their own thoughts, i.e. the practice of "Sadhana". Since our time in this life is finite, I want to make it count and use the power of fiction/thought towards creativity.
What art/artist do you most identify with?
Sparth, Andrew Jones, Jesse Van Dijk, Simon Stålenhag are some of the names among many many others actually!
What themes do you pursue the most?
Fiction, specially Science-fiction, ideally utopian. But I like to vary it across all sorts of fiction.
What role does an artist have in society?
Everyone is an artist at the same time in my opinion actually, so in essence society is made up of artists. I think math, science and pretty much everything is beautiful art from at least one outlook. And this kind of an outlook can do wonders in any tangent. Essentially artists can have/take-up any and/or every role in society.
What is your artistic outlook on life?
This is really tough to sum up, so I guess I could skim a few ideals. I believe that "imagination is the only truth" is true on many levels. I believe that even both-and solutions can exist simultaneously. I believe the spectrums of religion and science are both just languages, some more current that the others. I believe whatever we think, negotiates with the infinite thoughts that everyone has in a system that eventually manifests the illusion of our collective reality (Moh-Maya). I believe science also can argue for that notion from the young's double slit experiment, where simple lack of direct human observation changes the very nature of how all light behaves (wave or particle). I believe the cat in the Schrodinger's box can actually be BOTH dead & alive simultaneously just like light can exhibit dual nature. I believe the 'chicken came first' as well as 'the egg came first' are both true, and these solutions are only true while both are true together! Weather its mind over matter or matter over mind. In the same way, I believe we can justify our own thoughts to ourselves to lean either which way. But practicing thoughts, i.e. Saadhna (Sadhana/Sadhna) can be attained through any artform. Emotions are cleaner with pure thoughts. Meanwhile too much of literally anything can be 'too much', even water! And Change is the only constant, while to err is human. I believe nature is basically nothing but a sheer organic spectrum of diversity in a constant dynamic equilibrium in a wholistic picture. We add lots of nomenclature and our brains make them "labels" by adding prejudices of our experiences. Any experience that is happening to anyone, boils down to ones thoughts. Any artform can be your crutches to navigate and slowly snowball your way back into stability and/or sanity. Sometimes complete opposite solutions work best. For example, instead of being afraid of gaining a delusion, throwing yourself into the deep end of sheer and utter fiction, can help you maintain touch with reality too! Hence I really like concept art, game art/animation, illustration and such fictional art. These are some of my inner beliefs that I find relevant to my artistic outlook.
What advice would you give to your younger self?
Be who you are.
Do you listen to music while you are creating? If yes, tell us your favorite song and artist.
yes, almost always! Narrowing it down to just ONE favorite song has already taken me about 4 hours lol! So for now I will say Parkways by Flashbulb.
What's the best thing about being an artist?
Creating art.
What is your dream project?
Art direction for a mainstream believable ultra utopian (realism) science fiction movie that makes it as big as the matrix.