About Sreedhar

Hidden at about 188 kms away from Hyderabad in the historic Mahabubnagar district is yet another historic town called Gadwal. Known for the skills of saree weaving, the residents of Gadwal take pride in the fact that the first ever full-length saree to have folded into a match box was weaved in this very town. Today, Gadwal, apart from its rich historic heritage, is largely known for the traditional Indian saree and is also branded as Gadwal saree. This itself explains the importance of the sarees produced in the town.

The Gadwal town was once under the rule of Sri Nalla Somanadri and the geography under his rule was known as Gadwal samsthan. Hailing from this very heritage-rich town is an artist known in the preferred circles of art – Sridhar. Born in 1974, Sridhar’s skill in using the strokes of brush and combination of colours was apparently gifted by the God himself.

Without a formal teacher, Sridhar has miraculously developed the skill of portrait painting and has in fact to the astonishment of best of the artists has showcased the God’s gift to the who’s who of the art circles.

It was his teachers at the school in Gadwal, who had first discovered the artist in Sridhar. While the teachers were busy teaching and making the students write their class work in the school, Sridhar was busy making a portrait of the teacher. When the teacher wanted to see the class work and found that Sridhar was not actually writing, he was never agitated. Reason : The portrait of the teacher was spell bounding and did not make the teacher feel like punishing Sridhar.

Several teachers and head masters of the school have encouraged Sridhar to pursue his interest and then it was the turn of Sridhar to make use of the opportunity.

Sridhar was often take aback at the way the artists depend on a formal degree to prove themselves as artists. Pinning his hopes only on what he has in his fingers and mind, Sridhar at a time emerged as a teacher for many budding artists though Sridhar himself has no formal degree to showcase.

With all that art he has in himself, he remained low profile and never believed in the concept of “marketing” himself for gain.

It was in 2003, Sridhar made a portrait of Ms Anju Poddar and in fact that was his first “professional” assignment. This portrait has taken Sridhar places and the who’s who of the art circles started recognizing him as a “Realistic Artist”. Today, several industrialists and businessmen take pride in having a Sridhar portrait in their drawing room halls.

Apart from mesmerizing art lovers with the brush strokes, Sridhar tried his hand at Art Direction in Telugu Film Industry. He has specialized in make-up. Jointly with Ravinder Reddy, a nationally recognized photographer, Sridhar participated in several modeling photography sessions and brought to light various angles in modeling photography, which were hitherto undiscovered.

However, despite a spate of success in all that he has done, Sridhar believes in being an artist and he has drawn rich experience from all those assignments to again fortify his brush strokes.