Image courtesy of Pallavi.
PALLAVI
I’m Pallavi an IT professional in Seattle during the day and an artist at night. Life before COVID was making Indian folk art in between life’s responsibilities, commitments, day jobs and raising my daughter. It helped me navigate through life’s challenges and healing. I went back to making Indian folk art when I needed self-care and subconscious of feeling close to home which is India. My creative practice is very vibrant, and my artwork often reflects the world around me or where I come from. I can work with 3 primary colors and get the entire pallet with color mixing. Late last year I started experimenting with paint making to use in Indian folk art like traditional artists. Learning more about pigment chemistry I stumbled upon mineral pigments and found some amazing soil and rock foragers on Instagram. When I started looking around my house and hiking, I was not disappointed, my first foraging got me my primary colors that were vivid and vibrant Red, Yellow ochers on the same day just waiting for me to pick up, it was magical.
Art is my way to turn the conscious mind off for a minute and allow the subconscious to play! Practicing flow state and accessing that unconscious mind where I'm able to express and play fully and openly. Nature, Energy, Earth - trusting the process, however slow. I strongly believe that the pigments I make from foraged rocks all have a spirit to them. They have their own way of coming alive and interacting with each of the mediums. They crave more attention as they are touched, come explore their vibrancy and coming alive!
I sit in a space where I have my day job desk surrounded by labor of love, earth pigments, explorations of rocks, every earth color I’m managed to crush and bottle up so far as an art to admire the beauty and many others that are now in small bags to conserve space! All the colors you see here are as Natural as Earth herself in Pacific northwest. I do process a most of the rocks I collect so it is ready for my artwork. They have been carefully created, from land to hand to powder to paint, and each color is brimming with stories of old stone and wild weather. Making own artwork paints has been a very meaningful process, it feels like having conversations with ancient earth spirits and the energy flows from processing to paint making to artwork.
I love processing the rock and making to paint because that is when I feel the energy high and when mixed with water many of the ochers have the strong petrichor that emits a very strange and powerful experience to be transported to that place in a second. These pigments also come alive and interact very differently when mixed with watercolor binder to oils, so they bring life and beauty in different ways when we slow down and listen to them. Reciprocation is something I have learnt from well-known artists here in pigment directory. Working with nature is a give and take, I cannot emphasize enough the extent these beauties come and reach when we are very intentional in giving first.
This is a full circle moment, Indian folk art is made with natural colors, mud, charcoal, and leaves. 15 years ago, when I moved to North America, I started painting with interest in learning centuries old cultural Indian tradition art form in my own way not to realize that there came a day where I can do the same thing with earth. As I grind the rocks there is a connection between head, heart, and hand. It is like a ritual! This allows by changing its physical properties of paints and the painting that are created is born out of a journey! Earth to Art journey ~
Image courtesy of Pallavi.
Image courtesy of Pallavi.
Image courtesy of Pallavi.