Kimi paints her way to become artist

Avneet Kaur

Jalandhar, June 14

Kimi Juneja alias Manpreet (41) has always turned to drawing as her refuge. She says in childhood she had spent most of her time sketching girly faces and even in classroom while the whole class learnt lessons, she remained glued to her sketch pad, scribbling and doodling her thoughts away.

On asking her how painting came up as a passion, she replied, “Art became my passion as I was born in a family of artists. I used to sketch some random stuff in the class but later, in the race to score more and be a topper, my passion of painting was left behind,” she said, adding that after marriage when she completed her MBA finance, her husband encouraged her to start taking art seriously and it is since the past three years that painting became her path to entrepreneurship.

She added that she never learnt painting or took any professional classes, instead a little guidance from her sister Ravneet Juneja, who is a popular artist in Ludhiana, helped her master the techniques required in painting.

Besides, Kimi has also been honoured with the title of ‘Passionate Educator’ as she makes it a point to teach poor Class XI and XII students for two hours at a charity school based here near Geeta Mandir on daily basis.

When asked about her daily routine and how she manages time for painting, mother of two, Kimi said, “One is never tired of following their heart. I usually paint in the evening after finishing my household chores. It is a stress buster and a medium of happiness for me. It’s like being into another world.”

The genre of her painting is women-centric. “I make paintings with a lot of bright colours. Usually, the theme of my paintings rotates around a girl or a lady, depicting love, friendship, romance and beauty. My personal favourite is ‘Evening in Paris’, which depicts a lady in black attire behind the Eiffel Tower.”

She said for ‘Evening in Paris’ artwork, people had offered her amount ranging up to Rs 1 lakh, but as she had memories attached to that creation, she had placed that at the centre of her art gallery at her residence in GTB Nagar.

Talking about her journey, Kimi said so far she had arranged three exhibitions and people had poured a lot of appreciation and love on her.

“My first painting, ‘Wishes Unlimited’, was sold for Rs 25,000. Further, I am planning to hold workshops and participate in World Art Fairs abroad to display my artworks,” she said, adding that her artworks range from minimum Rs 15,000 to max Rs 1,00,000.

Sharing a message, she learnt from her journey, Kimi said, “Every person is born talented. What people have to focus is they should explore their talent rather than wasting a lot of time looking out for motivation. They should keep working hard to give shape to their talent and the hard work will pay off definitely one day.”