This project approaches collage and appropriation to explore embodiment and the female psyche. Images of women are taken from art history in order to ask  if painting can speak of itself; if it can become tautological. With this question in mind Vrinda looks at the relationship between the painting process and the painting object as one that can offer new perspectives on what it is to have a body, especially one that is female.

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Reclining nude
2013
Oil and synthetic polymer on canvas
146 x 131 cm

Tautolisque
2013
Oil on board
280cm x 138cm

 

Only longing to fulfill herself
2013
Oil and synthetic polymer on canvas
131 x 174 cm

 

Titled
2013
Oil and acrylic on canvas
131 x 96 cm

Nude- Modigliani, Freud, Henson
2013
Oil on Canvas
50 x 50cm

 

This is a series of six drawing made over six days. It is a portrait of Kathryn Dolby. The movement of her body through space was traced, marked and copied onto the paper. Images of her clothes from a photocopy machine were erased into these lines. In this project, Vrinda attempted to interrogate the process of drawing a ‘portrait’ by experimenting with different parts that make one. The way we move, the way we dress, what is left behind, what is left in front?

We strung apart #1
2013
Charcoal on arches paper
42x29cm

We strung apart #2
2013
Charcoal on arches paper
42x29cm

We strung apart #3
2013
Charcoal on arches paper
42x29cm

We strung apart #4
2013
Charcoal on arches paper
42x29cm

We strung apart #5
2013
Charcoal on arches paper
42x29cm

We strung apart #6
2013
Charcoal on arches paper
29x42cm

 

 

Selected works from life drawing sessions.

Confidant Hat lady
2013
Charcoal on paper
42x29cm

Pensive Hat lady
2013
Charcoal on paper
42x29cm

Today women’s bodies remain an object of obsession, caught between sexual advertising tropes and superficial feminist critiques. Exploring various poses through camera angles and line quality, Pose and Otiose investigates the intimate relationship between the female artist and model. As an artist and model, Vrinda aims to contribute to a diverse understanding of women’s sensuality within a society marked by the social-obscene. Through this project Vrinda asks ‘As posers, to what extent can we experience our bodies as far less natural, absolute, linear and homogenous than has been represented in the contemporary media-scape?’

Bath-time
2015
Oil, charcoal and acrylic on board
120x90cm

Three women
2015
Oil on canvas
107x110cm

Two Women #2
2015
Oil on board
73x55cm

Legs #1
2015
Oil on canvas
50x50cm

Legs #2
2015
Oil on canvas
50x50cm

Four Women
2015
Oil on Canvas
75x50cm

Bath-time #2
2015
Oil on canvas
117x87cm

 

This series of drawings accompanied and aided the works in the project ‘Pose and Otiose’. These are the Gouache Girls, drawings based on the true and intimate interactions between model and artist. They are made hyper-true and hyper-intimate through gouache and ink. Vrinda is interested in how this particular relationship (artist-model) can develop our understanding of the poser (who is commonly undifferentiated to womens bodies) for a varied engagement with womens bodies.

Gouache girls #1
2015
gouache and ink on paper
14x14cm

Gouache girls #3
2015
gouache and ink on paper
14x14cm

Gouache girls #4
2015
gouache and ink on paper
14x14cm

Gouache girls #5
2015
gouache and ink on paper
14x14cm

Gouache girls #14
2015
gouache, ink and oil pastel on paper
29x45cm

Gouache girls #9
2015
gouache and graphite on paper
29x19cm

Gouache girls #17
2015
gouache and graphite on paper
29x19cm

Gouache girls #13
2015
gouache and graphite on paper
15x25cm

Gouache girls #12
2015
gouache and graphite on paper
9x11cm

As women, images and paintings often tell us how we should look and consequentially influence how we feel. While growing up beneath the mountain Wollumbin, Vrinda was told once by an aunty, an original custodian of the land, that this mountain was really a sleeping warrior, that one day, she would wake up. This story left an impression on her and in pursuit of a progressive feminine image, Vrinda approached women within her friends and family to explore the strength of a ‘sleeping warrior’. As a woman, what does it mean to look strong? What does it mean to feel strong?

TARA
Oil on Linen
122 x 168cm
2017

ARUNA
Oil on Canvas
100 x 146cm
2017

SRIMATI
Oil on Canvas
70 x 108cm
2017

GOPA
Oil on Canvas
76 x 102cm
2017