Puchan Arts Inc. Fact
Sheet
Market Niche
Puchan Arts, Inc., creates one-of-a-kind, individually designed and handmade
kinetic sculptures/mobiles to add beauty, dynamic dimension and harmony to
the home, garden or office. Puchan Arts customers include individuals, dental,
OB-GYN, pediatric and other professional offices, consultants for interior
and exterior decorating, design and Feng Shui/Vaastu,
stores for gardening, children’s toys, nature products, novelty gifts,
new age remedies, interior decorating and art galleries.
Products
Puchan Arts produces a wide variety of styles of imaginative kinetic sculptures
that are each individually composed and handcrafted at affordable prices.
Puchan Arts’ array of art includes indoor one-of-a-kind mobiles, handmade
Earthy Mobiles (made of woods, metals,
glass, stone, shells,…), Motif Mobiles
(made with thematic compositions, such as fish swimming in the ocean, animals
in the jungle, planes in the clouds,…), and Abstract
Mobiles (contemporary compositions made with reflective materials). Puchan
Arts also creates indoor and outdoor Whorls,
Twirls and Flickers made with copper,
brass, and aluminum and displays these creations at 11
Art and Wine summer festivals throughout Northern California. Our work
is available at stores, galleries and on-line, and commission/custom work
can be ordered on request.
Philosophy
The art is a celebration of nature and encompasses Feng
Shui harmony, yin and yang balance, and positive chi energy. On the mathematical
and scientific side, Puchan Arts works with balance by using a harmonic
table that creates moiré array
patterns. This involves fractal, nonlinear
and chaos forms that inspire the scientific
and spiritual imaginations through shapes and mandalas
that are found in nature and are conducive to meditation. The essential vision
of Katyayini’s work is to illustrate dynamic change, growth, interdependence
and movement as we flow through and understand life.
Origin and Incorporation
V. Katyayini Murthy started Puchan Arts at the Santa Barbara Art and Craft
show while in college the late 1980s. Puchan Arts reopened as a business in
1999 and began selling Puchans in May 2002 online and at arts and wine festivals.
Puchan Arts incorporated in December 2003.
Clients, Stores and Galleries
- Dental Practices of Dr. Tom Eischeid, Alameda, Calif.
- OB-GYN offices at Kaiser, Oakland, Calif.
- Alameda Art Center, Alameda, Calif.
- Hawaiian Kite Works, Orlando, Fla.
- The Art Gym, Emeryville, Calif.
- South Shore Shopping Center window display, Alameda, Calif.
- District Attorney Children’s Center, San Francisco, Calif.
- Providence Veterinarian Hospital, Alameda, Calif.
- Tax Management Group, Alameda, Calif.
- Lockheed Offices, Walnut Creek, Calif.
2004 Events
- Silent Auctions for the Alameda Arts Council, Alameda, Calif., and Young
Art Lives, San Francisco, Calif.
-Alameda Mother's Day Spring Show, Alameda, Calif.
- Walnut Creek Art and Wine Festival, Walnut Creek, Calif.
- North Beach Precious Cheese Festival, San Francisco, Calif.
- Cupertino Art and Wine Festival, Cupertino, Calif.
- Los Altos Art and Wine Festival, Los Altos, Calif.
- Fremont Art and Wine Festival, Fremont, Calif.
- Alameda Park Street Art and Wine Festival, Alameda, Calif.
- Gravenstein Apple Fair, Sebastopol, Calif.
- Bodega Bay Seafood Art and Wine Festival, Bodega Bay, Calif.
- Peanut Butter Jam Festival, Alameda, Calif.
- Lick-Wilmerding High School Arts and Food Fair, San Francisco, Calif.
- Coffee for Thought art exhibit, Alameda, Calif.
Media Contact
Geoff Geiger
Geiger Communications
510.523.7874
Biography
The artist is Varanasi Katyayini Murthy, "Katya" or "Kat"
for short. She was born and raised in Minneapolis, Minnesota. "Katyayini"
is Sanskrit for Gaia, meaning Mother of the
Earth. Since early childhood, Katya has been driven by a love of nature, engineering,
design and the creative process, thanks largely to the legacy of her parents.
Her Brahman, East Indian father, Dr. V. Rama Murthy,
a Distinguished Geophysicist and Professor at the University of Minnesota,
studies the origin of the solar system. He was one of the primary investigators
who analyzed the samples from the moon and dated the oldest rocks found on
earth. When he built the second mass-spectrometer,
he exposed Katya as a child to his lab when he worked nights and she tinkered
at his side.
Her passionate, creative, Mediterranean mother,
V. Monique Murthy, was raised in New Caledonia. She came from a seafaring
heritage in Cape D’Antibe. Monique has taken Katya since early childhood
to galleries, museums, plays, concerts, performances, festivals and exhibits.
As her mother cooked, gardened, sewed, weaved, made jewelry or sculpted, Katya
quietly learned design and the creative process.
Katya has traveled around the world several times,
and her stays in India were especially meaningful. As a young adult, she became
fascinated with spirituality, exploring Kundalini,
Hotha and Tantric
yoga, martial arts and other ancient practices like Feng
Shui, Vaastu, Taoism and other philosophies
that contribute to a greater understanding of how to work in harmony with
nature. On the more scientific side, she was intrigued by Chaos
Theory, the Gaia Hypothesis, environmental
discoveries, and various inventors and creative thinkers, among them James
Hutton, Alfred Wegner, Albert Einstein and Benjamin Franklin.
Katya has always have been drawn to nature, art
and science and feels they are interconnected disciplines that all work their
way into her artistic creations. She holds B.S. degrees in environmental science
and geophysics from the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB) and
an M.S. in Confluent Education, also from
UCSB, which focuses on ways to enhance the creative process through techniques
that apply Gestalt therapy, group dynamics
and organizational politics. In both teaching and art, Katya strives to inspire
a cognitive awareness that helps people move to greater creative freedom.
While studying at UCSB, she financed her education
by selling her sculptures at the Santa Barbara Arts and Crafts show and teaching
in various capacities, including as a Naturalist instructor on a Floating
Classroom boat touring the Channel Islands for the Island Packers in Ventura,
Calif. and serving as a science consultant at La Patera Elementary School
in Goleta, Calif.
Since completing her teaching credential, also
from UCSB, in 1991, Katya has served as an earth science teacher for Hayward
Unified School District in Hayward, Calif.,; where she has been a department
chair, mentor teacher, curriculum trainer and union representative. Katya
still practices yoga (Tantra, Kundalini
and Hotha) and the Martial Arts (Coung
Nhu), loves the outdoors, her Hobie cat, dancing, playing percussion instruments,
and riding her motorcycle. She has great "joie de vivre" and is
excited about sharing her passions and creations.
Puchan
Arts Inc Story
People Katya meets repeatedly ask her, "Where do you get all of your
creativity and ideas?" "How did you learn to make such creations?"
Here is how Puchan Arts has become a growing, incorporated business that creates
mobiles and kinetic sculptures that enhance the lives of others by moving
with life, adding dimension and bringing enjoyment.
Katya’s Nature
"I create in the night or wake up with a new idea in the morning that
I just have to make," Katya says, "I’ve been like this for
as long as I can remember." Her mother recalls her as an infant in her
crib, unable to sleep. She would give her things to occupy herself, like a
phone book or box of cereal. In the morning she would find Katya sleeping
with piles or patterns of tiny pieces all sorted by shape, color and size.
"She is naturally curious and gravitated toward math and science, "
says her proud father.
"Katya is always very busy doing all sorts
of things," says Jason, her patient and supportive boyfriend of ten years,
"She has a passionate, motivated, outgoing and energetic personality."
Along with building her business and creating mobiles and other kinetic sculptures,
Katya beads, sews, crochets, paints, weaves, writes, dances, plays percussion,
gardens, does yoga, martial arts, sails, motorcycles and has taught environmental
science for 17 years while being very politically active in the educational
system.
"Maybe it’s her spirit and destiny,"
says Kathleen, her close and longtime friend, "I believe Katya channels
her ideas from the universe, creates them and shares them with others."
Graham, a writer, artist and close friend says " with her family’s
background, I think it’s in her genes."
Background
Katya has always been fascinated with nature; its dynamic harmony, interdependence,
interaction and wholeness. Observing the mechanics and movement of the dandelion
and maple seeds as the wind blew, pebbles carried by a stream, the movement
of the a jelly fish and eel in the water or a worm burrowing in the ground,
Katya celebrates, creates and shares her deep appreciation of nature through
her art. "I have always wanted to create something reminiscent of the
beauty in nature," says Katya, "I want to inspire others to feel
and appreciate the patterns, balance, harmony and motion in nature. My art
is like dancing to the music of the wind."
One morning about 25 years ago, Katya woke up
with a dream and began engineering her first kinetic sculpture. It was a bamboo
wheel with turbine spokes made of reflective mylar, which was then painted
with translucent colors. She made more in all sizes and some had up to five
on one axis. Her mentor, Bobby Hazard, member of Vista Del Mar Board of Education,
urged her to sell them at the Santa Barbara Arts and Crafts Show on Sundays.
Katya did and was overwhelmed by the response. People crowded around her display,
captivated by the unique art dancing in the wind, reflecting colors all around
and making optical illusions as the sculptures interacted.
Katya continued to play with more ideas and tools
as she diversified into creating a wider variety of mobiles and kinetic sculptures.
She became intrigued by her harmonic table,
the spirograph she had rediscovered from her
youth, fractals and moiré
arrays. Katya also learned about water jets,
laser cutters, bought an airbrush and dremmel and began expanding her abilities
with tools that enable her to move past previous limitations.
Encouragement
Since Katya has always made gifts for her friends and family, her friends
began to come to her for gifts for others. She began having Christmas shows
in her house for friends and family. With her creations all over the house,
including 23 mobiles in her bedroom alone, her CPA suggested she become an
on-line business.
Katya bought herself a digital camera, taught
herself Adobe PhotoShop and Dreamweaver, and built her web site. Encouraged
by her supportive companion, business seminars, friends and family, she ventured
into selling at arts and craft festivals
throughout the Bay Area during her summer break from teaching.
It rapidly became apparent that the general public
shared the enthusiasm for her kinetic sculptures. The response was overwhelming.
Puchans are alluring and captivating, evoking wonderment and appreciation
of nature and the universe. People are amazed once they take then home, put
them in their own environment, and see them move with life, adding dimension
and enjoyment.
"I’ve been blessed with good fortune.
It all has just come together and grown, " says Katya, ""I
am also very appreciative of countless people who have been supportive and
instrumental in the development and success of my business." Katya continues
to create new kinetic forms that "move with life, adding dimension and
enjoyment."
Testimonials
"I knew I liked it when I bought it, but I had no idea that it would
bring so much light, reflective patterns, shadows and beauty to the room,"
says Darlilne Wilford, a repeat customer. "They are mesmerizing meditational
pieces, ever changing and bringing tranquility,"
Cher and Barry, also repeat customers, wrote:
"We sit and stare at it at least once every day, it is always gently
spinning and giving us a new perspective. We are still in awe of the different
faces it shows, and it is frequently even better at night because of the street
lamps and odd colored flashes from the TV reflection. Thanks, we just love
it and want more!"
Catherine Williams, one of the many customers
from her shows, wrote Katya an e-mail along with sending morning, afternoon
and evening pictures of her whorl,
"I hung your mobile in my tree.
It is mesmerizing.
Luminescent in the shade.
I see a pebble dropped and ripples expand.
The formation of galaxies, swirling.
And shrinking, blinding light.
The Cosmos!!!
The Nautilus chambers,
Heart Beat,
Reflecting sparks at dusk.
I can't wait to see it at the full moon!!"
ALAMEDA ARTIST EXHIBITS EARTHY YET OTHERWORLDLY
MOBILES AT WEBSTER STREET CAFÉ
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Alameda, Calif.—November 1, 2004
V. Katyayini Murthy, an Alameda home owner for more than 10 years and a veteran
earth science teacher for Hayward Unified School, will be exhibiting her kinetic
sculptures beginning December 3 at Coffee for Thought on 1544 Webster in West
Alameda. An opening reception will be held from 5:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. on
December 3, and the exhibit will continue until December 11.
Katyayini, also known as “Katya” or “Kat,” has been creating
designs and interesting patterns since early childhood, and has been selling
her sculptures at California street fairs and festivals since the late 1980s.
In the past year alone, she has exhibited and sold her works at more than
10 Northern California fairs, including the Alameda Park St. Art and Wine
Festival and the Peanut Butter and Jam Festival. Katya’s art reflects
her combined interests in nature, science, spirituality and personal transformation,
and draws upon her eclectic family heritage and culture from both East India
and the Mediterranean.
After many years of creating her sculptures for friends and occasional street
festival shows, Katya officially incorporated as Puchan Arts, Inc., in 2003.
She is currently expanding to share her creations with larger audiences through
art exhibits, gift shops and other retail outlets. “Puchan” is the
name of the Sanskrit god who dates to before 3000 B.C. and represents movement,
change, growth, time and travel. “The sculptures are a celebration of
patterns in nature that inspire fluidity, change and inner harmony as people
flow through and understand life,” Katya explains. A growing coterie
of owners of her art find her pieces both beautiful and inspirational.
Coffee for Thought (www.coffeeforthought.net) opened in April of 2004 to recreate
the tradition of old time coffee houses where people can gather for entertainment,
community and company. In addition to artistic exhibits, they host poetry
readings, business meetings and study groups. The café provides numerous
opportunities for people to “get connected,” which is their company
motto. “We especially like Katya’s art because it’s whimsical
and playful,” says Jen Cameron, co-owner of Coffee for Thought.
For more information about Puchan Arts, contact Geoff Geiger at 510-523-7874.
If you wish, Geoff will arrange an interview with the artist, or take a spin
on www.puchanarts.com for more about Katya’s art and images of her stunning
pieces in full color and motion.
Click on images to enlarge
 |
 |
|
 |
 |
|
 |
 |
|
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |