Each woman in her frames conveys different emotions, giving subtle clues into their psyches. One of them stares out as hummingbirds fly behind her, close to her flowing dark tresses. In another frame, a woman baring her ribs wails in some unknown agony. The next one’s cold stare pierces through you, with a sense of eeriness. Cryptic images of children appear behind her in a landscape filled with rustic red, ochre yellow and black tones. It probably reflects her subconscious — dark and broody. Ten such intense frames make up Deepa Gopal’s ‘We’re Islands — Self Portraits’, which recently received an honorary mention at the Kerala Lalithakala Akademi’s state awards 2021.
As the title suggests, the paintings are about Deepa and the time she spent isolated from the world during the pandemic. “I started the series during the first complete lockdown in Dubai. It was March. Though my daughter and husband were with me in the house, I felt like we were all existing as tiny islands. That’s where the idea came to me. Most of the works in the series were inspired by my experiences,” says Deepa.
“I have been suffering from fibromyalgia for years. This is the first series where I’m openly communicating about my condition. During the pandemic, there were a couple of months when I was struggling with unbearable pain. In the self-portraits, there’s a painting of a woman with her skeleton out in the open, screaming in agony. That’s a representation of myself while in pain,” adds the self-taught artist.
Be it the changing political landscapes, nature, or a philosophical question, all her central characters in the frame are women. Women she has met or heard about, her daughter, or ones from her imagination. “I think women keep most of their feelings and thoughts contained within them,” says Deepa. “Be it her day-to-day life, worries, the political being inside her, the deep introspections — all are kept hidden from the outside world. It’s a huge internal world to be explored. So, naturally, my work tends to be about her, the woman living in this world. And that’s why I call my works Mindscapes — an introspection into the emotional and psychological states of feminine beings.”
Evolution
For Deepa, painting is cathartic. It is where she releases her pain and emotional turmoils. This is surprising, as the artist, who graduated in English literature, has never had any formal art training. Though she used to paint from childhood, it always remained just a hobby, something she kept close to herself, unlike her writings. “I started a blog around 2009. It had articles about art, artists and my poems. Shortly it became part of my life. As the readership grew, I started interviewing artists. However, even then I was reluctant to show my artworks to other people. I always thought there not good enough. But in 2011, I heard about a weekly art fest happening near my flat in Dubai. And I showed some of my paintings there,” she says, adding that all her initial works were inspired by folk arts.
Over the past decade, Deepa’s paintings have gone through several changes. Her works have become more surreal, personal and deeply connected to her writings. “My paintings and poems are intricately connected as I am the creator of both of them. As the realisation came, I started incorporating haiku into my artworks,” says Deepa.
Deepa became a regular presence in the art scene during the six years she spent in Kerala. “I visited numerous exhibitions, started reading up about art and artists, and studied by myself. Gradually, I was invited to join group shows and, in 2016, I started curating exhibitions,” says Deepa.