About

Anytime I got stuck in a place, wondering where to go next, I would remind myself of this line that has stayed with me: Your mountain is waiting, so get on your way. It’s what inspires me, moves me, and gives me the strength to take the next step.
My solo show at Triveni Art Gallery in 2023 was titled ‘There’s A Way’ and much like the artworks that depict mountains from my own point of view, the title itself sums up this philosophy for me.
In my own journey as an artist finding her way, I find myself surrounded by mountains, mountains that I have come to love and respect for what their offer, for how they make me push myself and my boundaries. Painting each gives me a sense of freedom, of having achieved something, and of having discovered and reinvented my own self. It’s everything that someone physically scaling a mountain would feel.
I also see mountains as a reflection of life. With their many layers and hues, and the harmony with which they all blend into a single entity. Balancing the colours, spaces, and compositions in my own artworks helps me do the same in life. And having peaked one mountain, it gives me the strength to attempt a bigger, more challenging one. The hours I can spend as an artist observing the colours, the contours, and the undulations that can so easily be missed by a single look washes over me with a sense of calmness and purity. And as I layer my own sensibilities over their tough and hard exterior, it allows me to witness the softness and the gentleness of what they are really made of.
To equip myself with this understanding and empathy for the subject of my paintings, I have visited many places in Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh. And each time I have approached them, I have realised that the mountains always offer a way to get closer to them, a path to their very heart. It is this that I want to highlight with my work. And make people see beyond the obvious. With each artwork, I experiment with colours, try different textures, give the mountain a little bit of myself even as I take a lot more from them to convey my thoughts and feeling to my viewers. Believing that if I continue to express with purity, I will be able to connect with those who view my art. So that we can all speak in one voice, and look at these beautiful structures with the same vision.
They say that you don’t get to choose the mountain, rather, they choose us. I too feel that the mountains have chosen me to complete myself as an artist, as a person. One canvas at a time. – RANJAN NAUTIYAL (Writer)