For Nani

The process of making this painting was a long-winded one. For the last few months, I’ve been having a recurring dream of my late grandmother’s bathroom tile. I remember when I was a child, and she got the new tile installed in her bathroom. I told her I loved it, and she told me, “Pujna (her name for me), you’re just like me, you love blue!”

The older I grow, the more I realize that everything that’s cool about me was cool about my Nani* first. She taught me how to drink black tea, chop almonds on my fingertips, and how to ask the tailor to alter my clothes to properly fit me. My first introduction to craft and making was through her (we stitched tiny pillows for all my dolls lol). In many ways, our time spent together is what led me to pursue a lifetime of making things with my hands.

At the end of January, I finally had the courage to start a painting for her. I had a very clear idea that had been brewing in my mind for some time. I wanted to make a large painting, border it with the tiles, and have a blue gradient in the center as a portal of connection. I worked on the piece for days, painstakingly color-matching each tile and getting a smooth gradient. But when I reached the portion of my piece where I began to add line work over the gradient, like I usually do, I went too far with it. The painting began to look overdone.

I was on a deadline, so I went to my printer to get it photographed and get a test print. The test print was alright. It was good, but I wasn’t fully satisfied with it. I knew if I went ahead with it as is, it would bother me for a long time. 

I went home, took a fat nap, and painted over everything but the tile border when I woke up. Once the painting was dry, I put a drop cloth on my room floor and placed the painting on it. I poured a layer of water over the piece, mixed a couple of watered-down colors, and started placing the pigments gently onto the water. I watched the colors spread and merge slowly.

I realized that the mistake I made the last time was being in too much of a hurry and not listening to the painting with patience, not noticing when I needed to stop. This time around, I stayed as present as I could and carefully considered every mark. After I was done with the first layer of wet-on-wet, I propped my canvas up and followed the motions that the water had created. I carved out lines with a fan brush, and this landscape emerged.

Strangely, I have so many memories of my Nani telling me about her childhood home that was in the mountains. I am so grateful I started over because it led me to making the painting I needed rather than the painting I thought I wanted.

The original is 30x40" in size and was made using acrylic on canvas.