Keres That Were: Eight Mixed-Media Paintings on Bengaluru's Lost and Shrinking Lakes

Keres That Were is a BFA final display project: a thematic series of eight mixed-media paintings about Bengaluru's lakes (keres) — those that have disappeared under bus stands, stadiums and layouts, and those that survive as shrinking, fenced water bodies. Bengaluru was once a city of interconnected tanks built to hold rainwater on an undulating plateau; many of those tanks have been filled or built over, and their memory survives in place names and old maps.

The series brings together two ways of seeing the same place: field sketches made at present-day sites and archival maps that show where water once stood. Each painting layers a map transfer, pigment made from lake-bed soil, and painted observation of today's site, so that the old shoreline shows through the new city like a stain that will not wash out.

The process moves through research on the history of Bengaluru's tank system, site visits with a sketchbook, thumbnail and colour studies, material tests (soil pigment binding, map transfer on canvas, layering acrylic under oil), final paintings, a display plan and an artist statement. The project is judged at the final display with a process portfolio and viva. It is a beginner-level project: it focuses on developing a coherent series, a consistent material language and the ability to talk about one's work clearly.

Abstract

This project is a series of eight paintings about the lakes of Bengaluru, combining observational painting, archival maps and pigment from lake-bed soil. It explores memory and loss in the city's landscape: how water that once defined neighbourhoods has been erased, and how it still shapes the city through floods, place names and remnant tanks.

Introduction

Many areas of Bengaluru carry names ending in kere or halli that recall water and villages, yet residents often do not know where those lakes were. News coverage of urban flooding in low-lying areas has repeatedly pointed out that water returns to its old paths. As a painting student living in the city, I wanted to make work that makes that hidden geography visible.

Context and gap

Painters have long used landscape to reflect on change — from colonial survey drawings of Indian landscapes to modern Indian artists who painted cities and their margins. John Berger's Ways of Seeing argues that how we see is shaped by what we know and are told. Maps are one such way of seeing. There is less work that uses the physical material of a site and its historical map together in one surface to question the present city. This series attempts that at a student scale.

Approach

• Research the history of the tank system through published maps, books and public records.
• Visit and sketch eight sites: four lost lakes and four surviving ones.
• Develop a consistent layered technique through material tests.
• Paint the series with a shared palette and format so it reads as one body of work.

Feasibility

• Practical: all sites are reachable by bus or metro; sketching needs only a small kit.
• Material: soil samples are small amounts from public edges, dried and sieved; tests confirm how they bind with acrylic medium.
• Financial: canvases and paints within the student budget; frames optional.
• Time: 20 weeks with fortnightly reviews.

Bengaluru's historic network of lakes has shrunk dramatically, and many lakes survive only as names of bus stops and localities. The loss is mostly invisible to people who live on top of it, except when floods reveal the old drainage paths. Visual art rarely engages with this hidden geography in a way that connects history, material and the present city.

As a painting student, the problem this project addresses is: how can a coherent series of paintings make the disappearance of Bengaluru's lakes visible and felt, by combining observed present-day sites, historical maps and material from the lakes themselves, while developing a consistent, well-crafted mixed-media technique? The outcome is judged on the unity of the series, the quality of the painting, the thoughtfulness of the research and the clarity of the artist statement and display.

In scope

• Eight finished paintings, for example four at 90 × 120 cm and four at 60 × 90 cm.
• Field sketchbook, colour studies, material test panels and archival research notes.
• Display plan, captions, artist statement and process portfolio.

Out of scope

• Scientific study of lake ecology or water quality.
• Installation, video or sculpture components.
• Sale or commercial reproduction of the works.

The project follows a practice-based studio method: research, observation, experimentation, series development, finishing and display, over 20 weeks with fortnightly reviews.

Reviews focus on whether each painting stands alone and still belongs to the series, and whether the technique supports the idea rather than decorating it.