Rithika Merchant - Providence (detail)
"My work is an act of self-soothing, a way of helping me to see hope in the future." - Rithika Merchant.
I greatly enjoyed viewing these intriguing works by artist Rithika Merchant in the airy, sunlit upper gallery space of the Kristin Hjellegjerde Gallery at London Bridge. In the paintings Merchant creates her own mystical, highly symbolic world inhabited by humanoid beings, executed in watercolour and gouache with some collaged elements. The exhibition sees Merchant examining the idea of terraforming a planet - modifying its atmosphere and eco systems to make it habitable and hospital for human life. Scientists are apparently theorising the practicalities of this idea too, to make the planet Mars fit for human habitation. These paintings are inhabited by hybrid, humanoid creatures with animal heads which appear to have taken their inspiration from the mythologies and paintings of Egyptian/Hindu cultures and gods such as Horus and Ganesh. Inspiration too could have been taken from Surrealism, the Symbolists and the likes of Hilma af Klint (here), who also created a stylised, idiosyncratic visual language of her own based on geometric and organic elements. Certain paintings here were also reminiscent to my eyes of the artwork and designs found on modern tarot card packs. Both the artist and gallery are interesting new discoveries.
Mothership II
Mothership I
Quantum Fluctuations
Providence
The Requiem
Astral Habitat
Structural Bifurcation
Biome in Bloom
Plant Medicine
The Albatross
Rithika Merchant: Terraformation
until 30th September
Kristin Hjellegjerde Gallery (London Bridge)
2 Melior Place
London
SE1
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