Rithika Pandey b. 1998
Works
Biography
Rithika Pandey (b. 1998, Varanasi) lives and works in Mumbai, India. She has grown up in Nigeria, Ghana and Kenya. Pandey graduated with a BA (Hons) in fine Art from Carmarthen School of Art, Wales, UK (2020) following her studies in Contemporary Art Practice at Srishti Institute of Art Design and Technology, Bangalore, India.
Pandey’s roots place her in Varanasi — an ancient site of funeral rites and sacred waters. Her protagonists enter onto this stage. Painting is used to create a theatrical space where more-than-human entities enact complex, dynamic rituals in the chasm between life and death. Amongst these entities are Pandey’s Bloomdidos — nomadic, dark-skinned figures, fashioned after the fierce emancipatory goddesses, Kali and Dakini. The Bloomdidos converse non-verbally with other entities on their stage in the interest of compassionate inquiry. An awareness of – but not necessarily adherence to – mortality is pervasive. Her entities bleed, secrete and eject. Birthing, dying, healing and regenerating endlessly.
Tentacular and purgatory super-species — plant-like, animal-like, anthropomorphic and absurd — reach through almost every plane illustrated. Informed by Donna Harraway’s ‘Tentacular Thinking’ and the ‘Chthulucene’, these tentacled lifeforms stand for the other and the non-human. They ask us to explore expansively and somatically, by implementing a way of existing and seeing that isn't two-armed, two-eyed, two-eared and one-brained, but many-armed and many-brained.
The scenes Pandey depicts do not accede to a linear, colonised time and space. Barren landscapes have potential to become domestic spaces and often exist as both simultaneously. Similarly, the narratives in Pandey’s paintings revoke dichotomisation. Futurity is explored without a requirement for separation from the ancient and mystical. She navigates paths of inquiry that do not utilise hierarchy. Both the scientific and the mythological have equal footing.In this way, the paintings are a worldbuilding exercise.
Pandey’s painted dioramas appear to be surrealist; nonetheless, they transcend this categorisation. Approaching narrative inquiry through an ecological lens, Pandey’s matter expands into a super-ecological surrealism that speaks not of the end of the world. Rather, it challenges us to picture its fantastical continuation.
Pandey’s roots place her in Varanasi — an ancient site of funeral rites and sacred waters. Her protagonists enter onto this stage. Painting is used to create a theatrical space where more-than-human entities enact complex, dynamic rituals in the chasm between life and death. Amongst these entities are Pandey’s Bloomdidos — nomadic, dark-skinned figures, fashioned after the fierce emancipatory goddesses, Kali and Dakini. The Bloomdidos converse non-verbally with other entities on their stage in the interest of compassionate inquiry. An awareness of – but not necessarily adherence to – mortality is pervasive. Her entities bleed, secrete and eject. Birthing, dying, healing and regenerating endlessly.
Tentacular and purgatory super-species — plant-like, animal-like, anthropomorphic and absurd — reach through almost every plane illustrated. Informed by Donna Harraway’s ‘Tentacular Thinking’ and the ‘Chthulucene’, these tentacled lifeforms stand for the other and the non-human. They ask us to explore expansively and somatically, by implementing a way of existing and seeing that isn't two-armed, two-eyed, two-eared and one-brained, but many-armed and many-brained.
The scenes Pandey depicts do not accede to a linear, colonised time and space. Barren landscapes have potential to become domestic spaces and often exist as both simultaneously. Similarly, the narratives in Pandey’s paintings revoke dichotomisation. Futurity is explored without a requirement for separation from the ancient and mystical. She navigates paths of inquiry that do not utilise hierarchy. Both the scientific and the mythological have equal footing.In this way, the paintings are a worldbuilding exercise.
Pandey’s painted dioramas appear to be surrealist; nonetheless, they transcend this categorisation. Approaching narrative inquiry through an ecological lens, Pandey’s matter expands into a super-ecological surrealism that speaks not of the end of the world. Rather, it challenges us to picture its fantastical continuation.
Exhibitions
-
Continuum (after Jitish Kallat)
60 Years of Gallery Chemould | Group Show 14 Sep - 18 Nov 2023To celebrate the 60th anniversary of Chemould Prescott Road, we are delighted to present an exhibition titled 'Continuum' (after by Jitish Kallat) featuring 10 emerging Indian artists, opening on Thursday,...Read more -
Birth of Forgiveness
Chemould CoLab | Rithika Pandey 12 Jan - 25 Feb 2023For Rithika Pandey’s first solo show in India she brings us nine tableaus: paintings in pursuit of healing and transformation. Compared to previous bodies of work, Birth of Forgiveness displays...Read more
Art Fairs
