HYDERABAD: Artist Vanita Gupta’s works titled The Folding Cloud, displayed at Kalakriti Art Gallery, are a wonder of one-stroke work. The exhibition, which is on until the end of the month, has certainly impressed people who came in from different corners of the city and elsewhere, to get a glimpse of her work.
Speaking about her work on display, Vanita shares, “They are a compilation of my paintings, sculptures, and video installations my paintings are one-stroke achievements.” She explains her process, saying, “While I am painting, I go through the tight-rope walk, because, a little imbalance could be a mishap, it’s a challenge with every work that I do. I go through immense pressure which leads to the resulting aesthetic that is separate from each other and yet is quintessential Vanita Gupta.”
Mentioning the inspiration behind her current work, she says that it emerged from a poem she wrote in written in Hindi. “It goes like this: kisi ne apni cycle bade badal ke neeche lagai thi, parr ab pata nahi woh badal kahan gaya? aur woh, cycle chhod badal dhoondhta raha. ( excerpts from my forthcoming novel Anshi) it’s very metaphorical. Such thoughts that I go through, are my inspirations for artwork. These are the clues that shape my vision in art.”
Asked if her work is didactic in any way, she responds, “Message is secondary in the process of art. Pure art is invested in creating an aesthetic that evokes an emotion within the viewer. Within this body of work, I want to evoke the feeling of lightness even within the darkest and hardest of materials. The lightest moments of our lives often become the bookmarks in our lives. The introductory poem tries to talk about a similar feeling. I think this show drifts within that emotion, and I hope the viewers find that here.”
Since 2017, Vanita says, a lot of her research went into making rubber and metal sculptures. “I went to rubber factories and met people who had done a PhD in rubber. Finally developing a component that had the right tenacity to challenge the iron vices I had found at a chor bazaar in Mumbai. The balloon and brass sculptures, two pieces that you see in this show, were shown at Art Heritage Gallery, New Delhi in 2015, and Pundole Art Gallery Mumbai in 2019. This is the first time that I have experimented with fabric.
My collection of fashion sarees was exclusively created for Kalakriti Art Gallery. Each saree is one of a kind, single edition. I would like to call them ‘wearable art.’ The paintings on canvas were created over a period of two years, especially for Kalakriti Art Gallery,” she tells CE.
Currently, Vanita is working on a large body of sculptures and her video work ‘Balloon Trilogy’ will soon be shown at Creative Miles Art Trail, at Waterman’s London in September 2022 and a couple of other projects that are still under wraps.