Shakuntala Kulkarni often revisited the oeuvres of the well known Japanese designers, Rei Kawakubo and Yohji Yamamoto, and went back to several of their early collaborations. In one of their Paris shows, she was stunned by their use of black. Sharp forms, sometimes bulging, sometimes ballooned - they felt as if floating in space. The black charcoal came to instant rescue aiding the costumes that her women began to dress in – with their dark, dense, and heavy shapes, creating an opacity that felt unexpected and joyful in their 'non-colour'. She then began to look at hairstyles –from Freida Kahlo, hairdos from old Biblical images, ancient Roman, Greek to the woman on the street that she saw daily whose unwashed hair created its own matted style that haute couture models would find hard to imitate: hair became an imperative statement in Kulkarni’s parade. In her latest series Stuck in the shadow - she began by drawing the bodies of women who had passed their prime - bodies that made new shapes: sagging breasts, stomachs swelled – the charcoal along with the space the large white sheets provided, allowed for voluminous forms. Here, strange bodies are caught in moments where they are about to topple: almost falling out of their own shadows, only to be saved by their sense of balance.