Neetika Chopra

I have been drawing ever since I remember. Doodles, sketches, water- colours – unconscious, spontaneous responses to the wild beauty, symmetry and colour I saw around me in Tanzania where I grew up.
I create art today, but I studied commerce at the Shri Ram College of Commerce and worked in a finance company for a while. In a way, I consider myself blessed that I did not grow up in times when parents rushed their children off to Art School at the tiniest hint of talent. I was allowed the space to incubate my inner impulses without being fettered by the relentless deconstruction that robs art of its magic. I learnt perspective, anatomy and light as I experienced it. The human body fascinates me – the fluidity, texture and grace. All this finds expression in my art.

All through the troughs and peaks of my life – the journey through marriage and motherhood, my art has stayed with me. To paint was to find comfort, power and selfexpression. I joined Triveni Kala Sangam for a few years under the guidance of Mr Rameshwar Broota. I also did a two month program called ‘The Business of Art’, conducted by YWLP India and DAG Modern. Both these experiences helped me find definition, clarity and an artistic vocabulary distinctly my own.
For the first time I began to view my own art objectively. I began to see how what an artist creates, in turn, creates the artist. I am shaped by what I paint. The mind, the hand that holds the brush, the picture on the canvas, the eye that views it, the mind that absorbs it – it is one unbroken circle.