Artist portrays women strength, tribal spirit through monochromatic canvases

“Women are strength, they are strong, they take the weight of the world upon themselves without flinching and the women around me are joy.” Big-eyed, strong women with flowing tresses and huge horns on their heads; women with oversized dots on their foreheads (almost mimicking a third eye); women locked in an embrace, gazing into the future, or simply reclining—Jalandhar-based artist Saruchi Sharma’s largely monochromatic and minimalistic canvasses are centred around women. A painter, teacher, daughter and mother, Saruchi Sharma celebrates women through her art. In her 25th year of teaching, she aims to share her artistic wisdom and inspirations with her enthusiastic students. Her mother, mentors and daughter have been her greatest muses. Her work borrows tribal, raw and mystic energy—which she says emanates from women. Early in her artistic career, a two-month stint with tribal Santhal women in Santalbari village near Shantiniketan became a foundational experience that still guides her art. She didn’t know it then, but the fickle urgency of that field-painting experience would also shape her choice of medium permanently. Driven by the need for speed, Chinese ink and Conte pastels became staples in her work. “On the go, you can’t choose a thousand colours, brushes and hefty canvasses. So I chose mediums that dry quickly and can be rolled up. As a result, monochromatic and minimalistic became my go-to style of painting, which continues to this day,” she says. Among contemporary influences, she cites painter A Ramachandran’s intense tribal women. Mentored by city-based painters Basudeb Biswas and the late Dr Surjit Kaur, elements of their artistic influence are evident in her canvasses. That relationship with mentors continues—Biswas is a regular at Police DAV School, where she teaches, now mentoring her own students and introducing them to clay, reliefs and workshops across various mediums. Support from Saruchi’s school has played a key role in shaping her art. She says, “Our school principal, Dr Rashmi Vij, is among the women who spark joy in my life. If I want to go big on an art project, she is always inspiring us to go even bigger. She encourages us to hold regular workshops and explore new mediums with ever-new artists. ” While she has held solo shows at Virsa Vihar in Jalandhar, she dreams of holding another solo exhibition of her own soon.

Jalandhar