Wanting to do something unique and exciting with art, a Kerala-based artist has been creating beautiful pieces using human hair.
23-year-old Midhun RR, who hails from Thamburu, Nellimoodu in Kerala, is an architecture student.
Seven months ago, he started experimenting with human hair in his artwork by creating portraits of famous personalities such as Mahatma Gandhi and Sachin Tendulkar.
Midhun works with hair donated by his friends and it is definitely not an easy medium to work with. He spends considerable time cutting the strands of hair into different lengths before chemically treating them so that they are easier to handle.
Explaining the procedure, Midhun told The Quint, "I spray formaldehyde on the hair strands that are donated by my friends and then dry them for 20 to 30 minutes. Then, I cut the hair strands at various lengths, depending on the image and then arrange them one by one using needles. It requires a lot of patience and time."
However, on his blog, Midhun has a word of caution for those who wish to try this method.
"Keeping in mind that this procedure might cause skin infections and allergies, it is important to avoid any direct contact with skin. It is also advised that the mouth and nose be covered," he wrote.
The artwork, once dried, is encased in glass panes to avoid any damage.
Each piece, which is made painstakingly, requires nearly three hours to finish.
So far, Midhun has created ten such hair artworks, but says he is still experimenting with the medium.
Midhun's tryst with art began when he was very young. He began painting and sketching when he was around 7 years old. But he always wanted to do something different and that was one of the reasons he started working with hair.
"I was in class 10 when I won a rocket model making competition conducted by ISRO. That was the moment when I started taking my work seriously and started devoting my maximum time to art. But I had always wanted to try something different. We all have seen artists using leaves and pencil shavings. I wanted to come up with something really exciting. So I came up with the idea of using hair strands," he told TNM.