May you live in interesting times, goes a Chinese adage. I’m here in India in one such interesting time of its history, says Aleksandra R Rose an artist-cum-designer-cum-teacher, born and brought up in Subotica of Yugoslavia, Belgrade, married to a South Indian and catering to the industrial requirements of design in Bangalore!

She lived in ‘interesting times’ in Yugoslavia too. She was there during its turbulent civil war.

Ms Rose is a member of the exclusive 'Q' Group of creative artists in Yugoslavia. and has been a participating guest artist at the 'Terra' Art Colony in Yugoslavia (1994), and the 'Oroshazi Muveszeti Muhely' Art Colony in Hungary (2001).”Yugoslavia suffered a kind of isolation in 1990s due to the civil war. Communication with European countries was severed. To bridge this gap and reach out the world outside, these art colonies were started,” she explains.  

It was difficult to get even visa during the war, she recalls. Once, she managed to obtain a four-day visa to visit an art gallery in London. This was a turning point as there she met Dr Akash R Rose, who later became a partner in her life as well as in the institution they launched together in Bangalore.

Their marriage was held in St Mark’s Cathedral Church in Bangalore. “Ever since our marriage, we had dreamed of setting up a different kind of institution — which has now materialised in the form of NCIC (National Institute of Creative Communication),” says Aleksandra with a twinkle in her eyes.

Fine art foundation
She is a graduate of the College of Fine Art and Commercial Art, (VSLIPU), Belgrade University. In addition to being an accomplished artist, she is an expert Illustrator and graphic designer. She holds a complete six-part TBEC-Accredited Master's Certificate in Photoshop, and has acquired deep expertise in Adobe CS as well as other industry-standard software packages. Using her strong fine art foundation as a root, she employs digital media for graphic design and internet-oriented imaging, and executes complex illustration and animation on both Windows and Linux platforms.

Her area of study at Belgrade was specifically in the discipline of fine-art teaching. She has taught at a State School in Yugoslavia for several years, and has organised auction exhibitions and promoted the work of young students, particularly in the realm of unconventional media and materials.

Her passion for teaching, art and design has made her dedicate herself to NICC.  The difficulty in getting exposure to outside world and proper education that she found in Belgrade has made her now think more about incorporating working experiences with learning theories in the curriculum at NICC. She is a co-founder of the pan-disciplinary professional training institute, NICC, and her synthesis of traditional Fine-Arts teaching with linked Computer-Arts training forms a crucial cornerstone of the Institute's foundation programme.

The common thing she found in Belgrade and India is the priority given to family set up. It made her feel at home in no time after she came to India with Akash. This commonality served as platform for her to establish relationship with others easily.

“Akash, who is a doctor, makes a perfect match for me because of his multi-faceted personality as photographer, designer, violin player etc. His mother and my mother both are artists - so there is an artistic streak running in both the families,” she laughs.

“Before I landed in Bangalore, I imagined it to be a typical hill station with wooden cottages. But contrarily, it’s a hub of industries demanding creative designs -either in setting up institutions, packaging design etc.” Rose says her inspirations are also the lush green locales in Kerala, the cold systematic urban environment of Delhi and the warmth of Bangalore, apart from the traditional art works of India. 

She thinks techniques of Tanjore paintings can be used in industrial design as well as fashion, just by integrating it with the digital media.  In India, working with handpaper made of different materials has opened a new dimension of art for her.

“Though I’m more into designing now I want both art and design,” she says. Her future plan is to organise visiting exhibitions of Indian and Yugoslavian artists in both the countries. In this sense, she ‘transcends’ physical boundaries of countries and cultures, and  belongs to both the west and the east now.  Her works have been exhibited at various venues in Europe, and many of her paintings are now owned by private collectors in Yugoslavia, Hungary , Sweden and the UK. She was honoured to act, on invitation, as Judge of Fine Arts at the sixth International Abilympics hosted by India in November 2003. The memories of the event still lingers in her mind.