BENGALURU : It is never too late to do what you want to do. Forty-year-old homemaker Heena Pari is holding her debut exhibition titled ‘Breaking the pattern’ at 1Shanti Road Studio, which will be open till December 28.Her art pieces are mostly painted white with vertical black dashes running down, like a running stitch holding together household objects around her. In fact, her home is where she experiments with her art. “My art is first tried at home. Inmy studio,” says Heena. “It took me two months to work on this project,” she adds. The conceptualisation was done a year ago.
She wants to bring to light the invisible labour put in by homemakers. “I have always lacked confidence to introduce myself as a homemaker since society stereotypes us as those idly enjoying our lives, but the truth is, we are working 24/7,” says Heena. To send this message across, loud and clear, Heena has used a Gujarati recipe book as a palimpsest to create collaged patterns and self portraits.
“The cookbook is in fact a pearl of wisdom and I have used it in my art to depict that the role of a homemaker in the kitchen is that of a person who ensures nutrition and health of family members,” says Heena.
She uses various medium of art including digital graphics, water colours and fabric stitches on household items such as kettle, cups, stoves and oil cans.”I use the line patterns because it allows continuity,” says Heena, who also adds that black and white patterns come naturally to her.
The sense of continuity of breaking patterns is important to her as an artist as well as a homemaker, juggling between responsibilities of baking cookies or completing her pending sketch.
Heena Pari, a Gujarati, was born and brought up in Mumbai. She graduated as a commerce student and though art was always her passion, she pursued it earnestly only in 2011. Now at the age of 40, she says she is gifting herself the exhibition as her 40th birthday gift. “I reached the stage where I thought I should do something for myself. My family supported me and I feel fantastic and confident about doing this exhibition,” Heena adds.Her exhibition reminds women at the amount of effort they put in to the running of a household. “A lot of women have been coming for the exhibition and they gasp saying Oh gosh, I do so much,” she laughs.