Metal Artist - Zohair Diwan
Zohair Diwan, a science graduate from Wilson College, started his career working with a fashion designer. But, as destiny would have it, he had to leave that field and join his family's steel fabrication business of civil construction and an engineering workshop.
His elder brother, a mechanical engineer, told him, "steel is such a wonderful metal to work with. If u hold it, at the right place and press it at the right place, you can make it dance on your fingers". The words sank in deep and gradually he absorbed the entire fabrication process. He started making different shapes and small sculptures from leftover steel in his factory.
He started to see steel with a different perspective and started using it differently. His science background made him experiment with chemicals on metals, pitting, pigmenting and rusting them with their inherent beautiful textures and hues. Slowly that hobby found its way into his work and he started doing things differently... the repetitive common place iron railing with its functional usage was made into a big 3D canvas, which though retaining its functionality, was made into a piece of art, running across the entire bungalow with a new freshness and real interactivity with everything around it. He created art with a purpose. A poem transmuted to a song on the tune and rhythm of functionality and practicality. The mundane jail like grill was transformed from the ugly duckling it was, to a beautiful swan, gates became landmarks of places where they were installed. Furniture, name plates, murals were all given his distinct mark of being presented very uniquely and in a completely new light. Copper, aluminum, stainless steel was used; wood, siporex and fibre was incorporated... even thermocole and papier mache was used for stage shows and events.
His team comprises of Shaloo Sharma (masters in fine arts), Shailesh (artist), Sachin (artist). He has expert craftsmen working under him giving him freedom to take vast jobs. He knows welding, gas cutting and other processes but seldom does it personally now. He likes to paint and can clothe different metals in there own rust oxides and sulphates. Sometimes he will just present his work grinded to a nude inherent simmering finish with just a lacquer/Poly urethane coat over it to prevent it from rusting. He also gives different kind of antic finishes and multicolor streaking with paints.
Everything is hand painted. Nothing is powder coated and the whole effort is to give metal a new look, a new persona and present it in a way which not only the connoisseurs appreciate but even the lay men. Normally any form of metal art is generally thought of as 'arty stuff' which is only for exhibitions or outside installations and not fit for the interiors of our homes, but he strives to bring art into your home and at places which were till now occupied by mundane and repetitive elements. You don't need special niches on walls to have a mural or a sculpture, you can relish it as it fuses with the very ambience of your home, interacting with you and its surrounding in real time and real space. He has executed many projects in Mumbai, Pune and Bangalore.
His elder brother, a mechanical engineer, told him, "steel is such a wonderful metal to work with. If u hold it, at the right place and press it at the right place, you can make it dance on your fingers". The words sank in deep and gradually he absorbed the entire fabrication process. He started making different shapes and small sculptures from leftover steel in his factory.
He started to see steel with a different perspective and started using it differently. His science background made him experiment with chemicals on metals, pitting, pigmenting and rusting them with their inherent beautiful textures and hues. Slowly that hobby found its way into his work and he started doing things differently... the repetitive common place iron railing with its functional usage was made into a big 3D canvas, which though retaining its functionality, was made into a piece of art, running across the entire bungalow with a new freshness and real interactivity with everything around it. He created art with a purpose. A poem transmuted to a song on the tune and rhythm of functionality and practicality. The mundane jail like grill was transformed from the ugly duckling it was, to a beautiful swan, gates became landmarks of places where they were installed. Furniture, name plates, murals were all given his distinct mark of being presented very uniquely and in a completely new light. Copper, aluminum, stainless steel was used; wood, siporex and fibre was incorporated... even thermocole and papier mache was used for stage shows and events.
His team comprises of Shaloo Sharma (masters in fine arts), Shailesh (artist), Sachin (artist). He has expert craftsmen working under him giving him freedom to take vast jobs. He knows welding, gas cutting and other processes but seldom does it personally now. He likes to paint and can clothe different metals in there own rust oxides and sulphates. Sometimes he will just present his work grinded to a nude inherent simmering finish with just a lacquer/Poly urethane coat over it to prevent it from rusting. He also gives different kind of antic finishes and multicolor streaking with paints.
Everything is hand painted. Nothing is powder coated and the whole effort is to give metal a new look, a new persona and present it in a way which not only the connoisseurs appreciate but even the lay men. Normally any form of metal art is generally thought of as 'arty stuff' which is only for exhibitions or outside installations and not fit for the interiors of our homes, but he strives to bring art into your home and at places which were till now occupied by mundane and repetitive elements. You don't need special niches on walls to have a mural or a sculpture, you can relish it as it fuses with the very ambience of your home, interacting with you and its surrounding in real time and real space. He has executed many projects in Mumbai, Pune and Bangalore.