Funteresting – Episode 5

Every weekend when I start to write, I get the same feeling of – where did the week go! There are so many things happening all around the world every moment, some good, some bad, and yet, at times things feel so still. That is a very strange feeling because your scientific knowledge tells you that there is nothing in this universe that’s still – even the rocks which seem to be so immovably solid, are vibrating with energy, while the mind is telling you that nothing’s happening!

But that’s not what this post is about. This post is about something that I learnt last week and then delved some more and the ideas are so nice that I felt like sharing with everyone. On a side note, I want to say that I love the internet for all the wonderful news from all around the world that I get through it!

So the first article that I came across this past week was about a guy named Bryan Payne who has started a treasure hunting project called “Doodlestones” in his city – St.Louis in the state of Missouri, United States. He takes small rocks from a river near his home and doodles friendly faces on them with a “sharpie” (permanent marker), marks them with the date, #doodlestone and “finders keepers”. Then he puts them in odd places This is his effort to bring a smile on people’s faces everyday. Then people tell him about them on the facebook page. You can read the article here. I just loved the idea and the fact that it doesn’t take too much to bring a smile to people’s faces, which is so important when everyone seems to be struggling with something or the other in their day to day lives!

This intrigued me and I looked for more about what other people are doing around the world in their attempts to make this world a better place be it by making someone smile or making their cities prettier or to make a point through the medium of art. It’s so wonderful to know that even with so much destructive stuff going on, there are people with deep artistic sensibilities, who are doing whatever is in their capacity, to make art not as a means of livelihood but to instill hope and inspiration in others.
So in this search,next I came across another article about a Brazilian artist named Eduardo Kobra. I got to know that he has done really impressive work across the globe. And now in his home city of Sao Paulo, he has taken to painting colorful murals depicting the city’s issues.  You can read the article here.

Image courtesy Huffington Post

Then I found another article which gives the details of what’s happening in Afghanistan. Due to fears of violence, the rich and influential have kind of fortified themselves behind huge security walls. What do the common people do? They live outside the wall, without any protection. Some street artists and activists have decided to make a point by making some eye-catching graffiti on those walls and putting simple messages.They don’t have a lot of money or funding but they have an indomitable spirit which is fueling them to do this. You can read the original article here.

I am a big fan of street artists – not the people who deface structures with random spray paint – but the ones who see the potential in something mundane and with their imagination, bring out the beautiful from that ordinary thing! And this last article in this post shows just that. A very talented artist Nikita Nomerz, completely transforms mundane structures, which might even be broken, into something cheerful in the Russian city Nizhniy Novgorod. Have a look at the article here.

Image courtesy Weburbanist.com

There are so many more such art-projects going on around the world, people doing things in their own ways to make a difference, showing that it doesn’t matter where and in what conditions you live. If you have talent, you will find a medium to show it.

One sentence about the featured image – it is from Leipzig, a city in the eastern part of Germany, which I had the good chance to visit last year. There are numerous such wonderful artistic graffitis all around the city!

With that, I will close my post for today. Hope you enjoyed it. Looking forward to your comments and posts, if you like, for the event. You just have to add a pingback to my post by adding the URL in your post and I will be informed – https://reflectionsontheriver.wordpress.com/2015/08/29/funteresting-episode-5/.

Have a great weekend :-)..