ARTIST STATEMENT
Mumbai-born, Chicago-based artist, Tulika Ladsariya has been exploring the issues of labor, language and literacy.

Tulika’s paintings are a social commentary on the division of society through the iconography of labor. Photographs of figures at work- lifting, pulling, pushing, heaving- form the starting point. Her paintings showcase slum-dwelling construction workers perched on bamboo-encased skyscrapers, men carting heavy burdens on flimsy carts, illiterate booksellers and homeless brick workers. They form the metaphors and visual puns of the dichotomy of India.

Her sculptures are derived from familiar construction materials procured from around her surroundings. Bricks, lumber, plaster and bright house paint recur in her oeuvre.

Tulika’s didactic narrative and convergence of different artistic styles- are at once rooted in the everyday and surreal. Her vision translates into something that is painfully honest yet her use of color, texture and line give us hope. And this is what makes her work truly unique.

Her work has been exhibited in the United States and India.