A 100 letters to Alexa

Mahima Bhayana Mahima Bhayana is a National Fellow, training and researching techniques in miniature painting. She spent four years in Jaipur extensively training, researching and educating in techniques of this ancient art form. Bhayana ,has exhibited in various museums and galleries nationally and internationally including The National Gallery of Modern Art, New Delhi Lalit Kala Akademi, New Delhi Jehangir Art Gallery,Mumbai, Traverse Art Gallery, Nottingham, IAM, A Bus Art Museum exhibition in Los Angeles,and Ajuntamento de’Alella, Alella;Barcelona Her works are in the collection of Lalit Kala Art Akademy,The National Gallery of Modern Art She lives and works between Jaipur and Delhi.

Painting as a performance Miniature painting involves stillness of posture and disciplined breath control requiring utmost patience and attention to every mark. My wasli works are a representation of this physical behaviour of the technique. However my canvas works are a hyper movement of my body. The spontaneous behavioural approach through movement of body and breath towards a large surface is a child-like freedom to stillness, discipline and tradition. I view this contrast of the imagery and process of creating the works as a performative act of painting. It allows me to zoom in and zoom out of the techniques as my interaction with them progresses. I like to see this conflict as a duality that coexists in me, my approach, my beliefs, my emotions, my technique and the world. A 100 letters to Alexa In conversations with Alexa, the paintings are an act of provocative response to isolation (circumstance) in 2020. I am questioning the contradictory nature of politics of identity and social reality for women in private, public and virtual spaces through actions of my body on a surface, in the presence of my ally Alexa. The conversations have a varied flavour about them, they are chaotic, dramatical, comical, sexual, thrilling, emotional, fictitious and confrontational.

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