Celebration
Leaving home meant missing birthdays, rituals, ordinary dinners, and the many small moments that hold a family together. The process cost me the most valuable thing in life: time with my family.
In each painting, I write the names of immigration documents I was required to complete over the years. These forms often appeared as confusing combinations of letters and numbers such as I-120A or 1040-A. By transforming them into Nepali calligraphy, I reclaim these bureaucratic codes and turn them into a visual language shaped by my own hand.
The colors in each work come from photographs my family sent from Kathmandu of my mother dressed for celebrations I could not attend. She continued to show up for pujas, jatras, purnimas, birthdays, Dashain, and Tihar with grace and dignity. Even in her daughter’s absence, my mom continued to uphold traditions, dressing for celebrations and moving through life with dignity and resolve. Using the colors of her clothing as references, each painting carries the love and resilience of family across distance.
Building, 18"X14", Acrylic on Canvas, 2025
Another Classic, 18"X14", Acrylic on Canvas, 2025
Strength in Confidence, 18"X14", Acrylic on Canvas, 2025
A Classic, 18"X14", Acrylic on Canvas, 2025
*SOLD* Sky and Subtleties, 18"X14", Acrylic on Canvas, 2025
Taking Risks, 18"X14", Acrylic on Canvas, 2025
Unique Thought Process, 18"X14", Acrylic on Canvas, 2025
*SOLD*: Open Minds, 18"X14", Acrylic on Canvas, 2025
Peaceful Moment, 18"X14", Acrylic on Canvas, 2025
Important Complications, 18"X14", Acrylic on Canvas, 2025
*SOLD* Tihar Festival of Lights, 18"X14", Acrylic on Canvas, 2025
Graduation, 18"X14", Acrylic on Canvas, 2025
Strong and Clear, 18"X14", Acrylic on Canvas, 2025
Festivities, 18"X14", Acrylic on Canvas, 2025
A Wedding, 18"X14", Acrylic on Canvas, 2025
*SOLD*: More to Cherish, 18"X14", Acrylic on Canvas, 2025
*SOLD*: Abundance, 18"X14", Acrylic on Canvas, 2025
Sky and Subtleties 2, 18"X14", Acrylic on Canvas, 2025
Simple Delights, 18"X14", Acrylic on Canvas, 2025
*SOLD* Confidence, 18"X14", Acrylic on Canvas, 2025
Important Complications 2, 18"X14", Acrylic on Canvas, 2025
Favorite Intervals , 18"X14", Acrylic on Canvas, 2025 Note: $1000
Continue to Persist, 18"X14", Acrylic on Canvas, 2025 Note: $1000
Unknown Availability, 18"X14", Acrylic on Canvas, 2025 Note: $1000
Way Home: Friends
Way Home: Friends and Family is a series of paintings that centers the people and relationships that have shaped my sense of belonging. The works are built around architectural arch forms that echo thresholds, doorways, and places of gathering, spaces that mark both arrival and return. Within these forms, layered calligraphy, color, and gesture hold the presence of friends and family who have sustained me across geographies.
The paintings reflect the joy, care, and everyday rituals that make a place feel like home. On view at the ICA, these works operate as both personal homage and collective offering, inviting viewers to reflect on who carries them, where they come from, and what home means in their own lives.
Way Home: Friends, 2025 Acrylic on canvas 7' x 5' $45,000.00
*Sold* Way Home: Family, 2025 Acrylic on canvas 7' x 5' $45,000.00
Devi
Devi is a sub-series within the Celebration Series. My Devi paintings are portraits of my mother during one of my favorite Nepali festivals, Tihar. I stacked the names of the last three immigration forms I had to fill out to apply for my Green Card. Devi is my mother’s middle name and also means goddess in Sanskrit. In Devi, the gold whips represent the fierce energy my mother exudes and the energy I like to think I have or at least temporarily possessed as I went through the long immigration journey. The delicate but fierce gold gestures radiate off the canvas and on to the walls because the energy cannot be contained in a small space and must have the colossal presence that most of my murals embody.
Devi 1 Acrylic ink on canvas 30”X40” 2021
Devi 2 Acrylic ink on canvas 30”X40” 2021
Devi 3 Acrylic ink on canvas 30”X40” 2021
Home, too.
Inspired by my Home series, I have been painting these lettering patterns doing them again and again to make them balanced without any measurements or guidelines. The symmetry simply depends on the precision of my brush strokes and I regulate my breath to achieve this.
The paper I’m painting these on is very special to me. I brought them from Nepal from a paper store in the old part of Kathmandu where my dad grew up. The roads aren’t wide enough for cars so me and my dad went on his motorbike and carried the roles of paper on the back of the bike.
A bit of a scary ride back home but my dad supported me on this venture and it was special trip we made. It was really worth it especially given that I haven’t been able to see my dad for a year and a half due to COVID.
I have a limited stack of this paper and I know I won’t always get this paper the same way forever. I am thinking about how this piece came to be and the journey it took. Of course, I’m thinking of home some more and the objects I collected with my father.
Untitled Ink 1, 20”X30” Ink on Nepali Handmade Paper, 2020
Untitled Ink 2, 20”X30” Ink on Nepali Handmade Paper, 2020
Untitled Ink 3, 20”X30” Ink on Nepali Handmade Paper, 2020
Untitled Ink 4, 20”X30” Ink on Nepali Handmade Paper, 2020
Untitled Ink 5, 20”X30” Ink on Nepali Handmade Paper, 2020
Untitled Ink 6, 20”X30” Ink on Nepali Handmade Paper, 2020
Untitled Ink 7, 20”X30” Ink on Nepali Handmade Paper, 2020
Untitled Ink 8, 20”X30” Ink on Nepali Handmade Paper, 2020
Untitled Ink 9, 20”X30” Ink on Nepali Handmade Paper, 2020
Home
Home 1, Home 2
24”X24”
Acrylic on wood panel
2020
When the crisis began and people began to realize they would be stuck indoors for a long time, everybody wanted to be home.For me, flying back to Nepal to my parents’ place didn’t feel like a good option because I wasn’t sure if I would be able to come back as I assumed the travel restrictions would only grow.
Right now, I miss home. I want to be surrounded by the comfort of home when the world feels like it is ending.
In my painting series Home, I repeatedly paint the first letter of the Nepali alphabet Against blue backgrounds. Blue feels calming to me and it is also the color of the sky everywhere in the world. I believe that we are all in this together; all of us want to be home.
Unlike most of my paintings, I did not paint a word or phrase as Im finding it hard to come up with a message or a mantra during these turbulent times.
So I turned to writing the same letter over and over again with as much precision as I could. To paint each letter I held my breathe at the same points every time to get an even pressure on certain parts of the letter and this process became a meditation.
Repetition took the feeling of uncertainty away and welcomed a feeling of familiar comfort...just like home.
2019 and earlier
Manu-rach 30”X30” Acrylic and aersol on wood pane 2019
Moksha 1, 16"X16", mixed media on panel, 2019
Moksha 2, 16"X16", mixed media on panel, 2019
Moksha 3, 16"X16", mixed media on panel, 2019
Ashcharya 2 30”X30” Acrylic and aerosol on wood panel 2019
