Pavani Kotrike, living her artistic dream

Pavani Kotrike turns her passion into real business by evolving her artistic pursuits

Hyderabad: No one can stop you from being an artist and this was proved right once again. Although people around her were apprehensive on how she would ever make a career out of art, Pavani Kotrike never gave up. The 27-year-old, who hails from Kurnool, now does impressive portraits with both colour pencils and graphite and her days are quite busy with the number of orders she gets.

Pavani, who moved to Hyderabad three years ago, says, “I was always into art since childhood and would attend special art classes at school and take part in competitions. However, I did not have anyone to guide me when I decided to make a career in the field. I just knew about two courses – Fashion Designing and Animation – but everyone opposed me when I told them I was interested in it. But I didn’t give up and began searching for art teachers in my locality and honed up my skills. I learned later that art is commissioned and I was quite surprised.”

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Soon enough, Pavani tied up with art galleries in her area and began taking orders. And then she was introduced to the world of Instagram.

“In 2018, I started sharing my work on the platform and people began messaging me for portraits. I also followed fellow artists and tried to understand how it all works. Now, I charge Rs 2,500 for a black and white portrait and Rs 3,500 for a colour portrait. This includes frame and courier all over India. I get around 10 to 15 orders in a month,” she reveals.

Pavani pursued BSc Statistics and then did a TTC course in drawing. She is now venturing into the digital medium as she began designing wedding invitations.

“I gifted portraits to actors Samantha Akkineni and Sai Kumar, singers S Janaki and Lipsika, among others. Rana Daggubati and Miheeka’s portrait that I sketched had gone viral at the time of their engagement announcement. In the future, I hope to start an online store and showcase my work at an exhibition,” says Pavani, who had donated Rs 25,000 that she made through portraits to the PM CARES fund that’s helping people fight Covid-19 in the country.

The artist also runs a podcast titled ‘Telugu Kathalu’ on Spotify, Jio Saavan, Gaana, Google and Apple Podcast. She narrates interesting stories in her melodious voice and one of the stories is on how she met her husband.

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