In 2017 and 2018, Anoushka was selected as a showcase visual artist for Kearny Street Workshop, the oldest Asian Pacific American multidisciplinary arts organisation in the US. She was also selected to show her work at CA State Senator, Scott Wiener’s public offices, celebrating cultural diversity on the West Coast. She has shown her work in various galleries in San Francisco, and is in private collections across the U.S and India.
In September 2019, she decided to pack her bags and her art supplies to relocate to the base of the Himalayas for a 5 week art residency. We discuss the impact it had on her work and her upcoming first solo show in San Francisco.
Tell us about your latest artist residency and what made you decide to apply for it?
I had been predominantly focused on creating artwork in my studio in San Francisco, and I ultimately reached a point where it felt like I was in a never ending loop - always either creating artworks for a commission or for a show, without the time or mental space to play, push boundaries in my artwork and experiment with new mediums, ideas, and techniques. I realised then that I wanted to remove myself from my current context, landscape, and social obligations to find a new space to create. My criteria was a remote environment, and a self-directed art residency with freedom to create, and be inspired by a less urban, and more natural surrounding.
This desire was fulfilled last year, when I was invited to participate in an experimental artist residency called KYTA, in India, in a region called Ladakh at the base of the Himalayas. It is a high desert, with a very stark and surreal, albeit stunning landscape. It’s predominantly Buddhist and dotted with serene monasteries, and prayer wheels. I had the opportunity to live and create at over 11,000ft in a tiny village called Stok, with a group of multi-disciplinary artists from all over the world. At such a high altitude, the rest of the world drops away, and you are left with quiet, stillness and creative flow with the majestic Himalayas as the backdrop.
Traveling to such a remote place must have been challenging when it comes to preparing and packing for art supplies. How did you manage this?
Given the remote location of the art residency, it was critical that I carry in all my art supplies. This meant bringing oil paints, oil pastels, acrylic paints, brushes, mediums and solvents from San Francisco on 4 international and domestic flights over 45+ hours to reach my destination. I was fairly meticulous about packing all the different types of supplies in separate transparent zip lock bags, and in each of them, I included a printout called a Material Safety Data Sheet (MSDS) - which you can find on the website of any paint manufacturer - so for example, Liquitex, Gamblin etc will have the MSDS available online for each of their products. The MSDS outlines how flammable / explosive each product is, and this is the piece of data that most airlines authorities are looking for, to ensure that the product you are carrying has a certain flash point temperature that is deemed legal for travel. This is particularly important when carrying oil paints, and I usually make it a point to travel with predominantly non-solvent mediums. I also carried a duplicate copy of all the MSDS sheets in my hand-baggage just in case!
How did the experience impact your life and/or your art practice moving forward?
The experience was transformational. It sounds a little dramatic, but honestly it felt like I had been asleep at the wheel for quite some time, and I woke up - rejuvenated, and revived! For the first time in a long time, I had the freedom to create without the overwhelming pressure of completing a cohesive body of work or creating for a commission per a collector’s specification.
I am also inclined towards being a Type A personality, wheels constantly spinning in my head, and being a part of the KYTA residency, in the isolated environment, and minimal expectations other than to just create -- I was able get out of my head, and move into my body and heart. It may sound woo woo but I felt alive, and I discovered and nurtured an entirely new process, style and technique in my art.
What were your biggest challenges as an artist?
Some of the challenges from a more surface level - was the rustic environment, constant power cuts, sporadic hot showers and adjusting to the altitude. However, these were minor compared to the personal challenges, of really letting go of self-imposed expectations of how to use the time at the residency. For example, I came into the residency with guns blazing -- very much trying to control the outcome. I initially put a plan together and even a schedule to create a certain number of works, along a specific theme with the goal to showcase the entire body of work once completed. A few days into the residency, I realised that this was completely ridiculous, and the entire reason I was at the residency was to interact with my surroundings, and respond to them, and not to complete a body of work that I had pre-planned out in San Francisco. I wanted to slow down, experiment with different ideas and expect failed attempts, be vulnerable, uncomfortable and follow the flow.
And what did you enjoy the most?
So much of my joy at the residency came from collaborating with the other artists, brainstorming together, reveling in each other’s work and tossing out creative ideas. Taking walks around the village, hopping streams, and visiting the 71ft Golden Buddha statue at the top of our village with breathtaking views. In addition, I also had the opportunity to teach a figure drawing workshop to 5th and 6th grade girls in a local school in our village. The goal of my workshop was to encourage the girls to let go of any preconceived notions of how a body “should” be depicted but rather focus on gestures and loose lines that are imperfect and abstract to capture the essence and movement of a figure. It was an incredibly uplifting experience!
What advice would you give to other artists contemplating doing a residency?
If I could do it again, I would have stayed longer in Ladakh for at least another 2 weeks to travel. I would also encourage other artists to conduct a fair amount of research before applying to a residency to ensure the residency meets their needs. Basic research of course, on the place, weather, culture, art materials available in the location, and more specifically on the type of studio provided, if at all and curatorial expectations.
The female body seems to occupy an important place in your work. What prompted you to revolve around this theme?
The first 18 years of my life were spent in India, where as a young girl, you are unknowingly subjugated to the control of an outdated, patriarchal society. I was stripped of my bodily freedom -- made to feel very self-aware, afraid and shameful of my body -- taught as a young girl to constantly be looking over my shoulder to ensure that I was not showing “too much skin.”
Living in San Francisco for a decade now has been incredibly therapeutic, and gifted me with freedoms, and confidence to dismantle patriarchal biases that were instilled in me and tackle complex emotions of vulnerability and shame. Initially, when I found my way back to my art practice again, I started painting nude women I suppose as a way for me to connect once again with my body and work through the dysfunctional relationship I had with it. My artwork over the years has since evolved, to portray more subtle, nuanced emotions that lie beyond the mere physicality of a woman and her body.
Tell us about your upcoming debut solo show.
I’m super excited about my upcoming solo this fall in San Francisco. Opening night is scheduled for August, 29th and I’m hoping it can go on as planned given the current state of the world! I have been in a very creative and inspired space recently, and been working diligently in the studio for the last 4 months and will continue to do so till the show. It’s been an interesting time to be creating art through the COVID quarantine, and now through the BLM protests - Personally, I have experienced a variety of up and down emotions, anger and frustration broken up by moments of catharsis and have been channeling all the energy into my work.
Additionally, it’s become clear to me that art is not created in silo, without it being affected by the current cultural context. In my mind, especially now, Art is an essential business.The entire body of work for my upcoming show has been influenced and even co-created by the current socio-political climate. The show will comprise figurative oil paintings, juxtaposed with abstract acrylic paintings -- all of which evoke human longing, connection, and the natural overlapping of our stories. The figurative artworks speak to the importance of human touch, of non-verbal communication through gestures and micro-expressions, and this nostalgia is carried through in the abstract artworks as well. For me, this upcoming collection is a peek into my personal journal, and the artworks are weighed with the tension that I bear on a daily basis; the swaying of my emotions from loneliness to inspiration, and are tinged with memories of the immediate past, my current isolation and self-reflection, and hopes for a future of hugging, touching, and living in a changed world.
You are partnering with Glass Rice gallery for your debut solo show. How did the collaboration come to be?
I think in this day and age of social media, online presence and e-commerce, the role of galleries is being questioned - Personally, I think galleries are a critical part of the art ecosystem and will always continue to be. Nothing compares to being able to view artwork in person, in an intentional space. Also, building a relationship with a gallery is such a wonderful, familial partnership, where both the artist and the gallery support each other, and elevate each other.
I chose to work with Glass Rice for my debut solo show, as the gallery is run by an amazing, badass woman Cecilia Chia who has believed in my artwork and artistic expression for a few years now. After participating in a few group shows at her gallery, and building a relationship brimming with trust and collaboration and realising that we share the same ethos, and mission, I was delighted to move forward with my San Francisco solo show with Glass Rice.
In light of the Black Lives Matter protests that are currently happening across the world, what actions do you think the art world should take to become more diverse and inclusive?
It’s almost impossible for any American artist’s work to not be shaped by the current BLM protests and uproar in the U.S and in our communities. As artists, we communicate in a visual language and this is an important moment for artists, curators, galleries and museums alike to represent diverse voices, and highlight narratives that are being shaped by the current socio-political environment. It’s not enough for galleries to share an image of an artwork on social media by a black artist in a contrived show of performative activism.
This is such a deeply rooted issue and it’s critical for world-renowned museums and galleries to include and uplift POC artists, LGBTQ artists and other underrepresented groups -- especially, artists that are alive, and at the emerging - mid career level as opposed to artists that are no longer living, or are already very well established.
As an artist, how do you navigate your ethnicity?
When I first moved to the United States at 18 to a small, and very white town in Ohio, I immediately felt like a fish out of water. I didn’t completely fit in with the white students, or with the black students -- I was instead relegated to the unknown limbo brown space of non-belonging. For the longest time, I tried my best to fit in - to be more American. All I wanted was to blend in, and not stand out as an “other.”
Moving to San Francisco, a city that is a melting pot and that embraced me with open arms, I started to feel comfortable in my skin again. Soon after, I returned to my art practice after a few years working in the tech industry, and this catapulted me into a journey back to myself.
My artwork is a way for me to express my multifaceted identity; of missing home, but being at home all this time. If you look closely enough, in my artwork you can see hints of the little Indian girl, spending monsoons listening to birds in old banyan trees and gorging on marigold mangoes, and the confident American woman, unafraid of her body, her desire for freedom and unconventional ideas. This tension, expressed in colours, compositions, figures and abstractions is how I navigate this complex world.
