SELECTED PAINTINGS
THE WORLD BELOW THE BRINE
Gouache, Ink, Dreams, Cold Press Paper,14 in by 11 in
* In private collection
This painting is a meditation on the body of our oceans, and the oceans of our bodies that are over seventy percent water. Today, saturated with plastics, the state of both these bodies need attention and care. The title of the painting comes from the Walt Whitman poem with the same name:
“The world below the brine,
Forests at the bottom of the sea, the branches and leaves..
....Passions there, wars, pursuits, tribes, sight in those ocean-depths, breathing that thick-breathing air, as so many do,
The change thence to the sight here, and to the subtle air breathed by beings like us who walk this sphere,
The change onward from ours to that of beings who walk other spheres.”
REMEMBER NANA'S LOTUS AND NEELKANTH
Acrylic, Ink, Dreams, Cold Press Paper, 24 in by 18 in
This painting is inspired by a formative story about my Nana ji (maternal grandfather) who used to remind my young mother to learn from the sacred lotus flower - while a lotus grows in a swamp, it has evolved to be untouched by the filth that surrounds it. Two Neelkanth (literally meaning blue throated) birds take flight above. Neelkanth, also a name of Shiva, is associated with a mythological Samudra Manthan or "Churning of the Ocean” origin story about transcending poison. Neelkanth birds are increasingly impacted by poaching and pesticides. The time machine at the bottom of the painting is about discovery of family stories through the ticking clocks of modern life. A timeless turtle floats through the tides of time. I find it poetic that turtles are associated with the origin stories of my Indian inheritance, and with the Indigenous People and First Nations of North American land which (be)holds me presently.
TECHNOLOGY IS INNOCENT OR IS IT?
Acrylic, Gouache, Ink, Dreams, Cold Press Paper, 24 in by 18 in
This painting is a meditation on the evolving role of technology in our lives - is technology inherently good or bad, or is it what we make of it and how we find balance? This painting is earthy and at the same time has multiple technologies embedded in it - the colors, paint brushes, paper I used to make it, the camera with which I took the image, the printing technology which is part of the poetry book in the center (it has lines from an e. e. cummings poem - since feeling is first, that I love and first read thanks to computer technology), and the tools used to make the four chairs in the painting. The bike wheels in two other squares were made using technology, and so were the coffee cups that the bird humans in the painting are holding - these can all be means of belonging, shared experience, and connection, or isolation. How will we shape and be shaped by our relation with, and through technology ? In the exterior boxes of the painting are animals - are they the liberated ones in the absence of technology?
UNDER ONE SKY
Acrylic, Ink, Dreams, Cold Press Paper, 20 in by 16 in
This painting is a meditation on the inter web of all life on our planet - across the beings of land, water, air, and earth. Can humanity rise beyond the elaborate taxonomy of separateness that we have created - separation of people from people, from ourselves, from the super organism earth of which we are an integral part ourselves? Will we realize that under one sky, all organs of this super organ-ism must be nourished for the whole to be healthy? Or, like a game of cards, would we keep bluffing our own selves in the end?
BAOBAB DREAMS OF A PEACOCK
Acrylic, Ink, Dreams, Cold Press Paper, 24 in by 18 in
* In private collection
This painting is inspired by the magnificent ancient Baobab trees of East Africa that are now endangered by Climate Change, and the resplendent Indian peacocks - my favorite bird. Life giving stories of my planetary movements and relationships are tied together with both these symbols. What happens when different geographies of our lives come together? What can a life beyond singular definition of belonging mean?
THE PEACE TREE: SHANTI MANTRA EARTH MEDITATIONS
Acrylic, Ink, Dreams, Cold Press Paper, 24 in by 18 in
This painting, made in the early days of Covid-19 global lockdown, is a meditation on the Shanti Mantras/ Peace Prayers found in the Upanishads. The prayers are rooted in a wish for peace in three realms - inner, external, psychic. In his letter from the Birmingham jail, Martin Luther King Jr writes of a negative peace which is the absence of tension vs a positive peace which is the presence of justice. In a time of global suffering and turmoil, ‘The Peace Tree’ is a deep wish for realization of positive peace for people and beings everywhere.