Art is everywhere series
In 2019, my painting F1 in Orange and Yellow was selected by Tate Britain, the BBC, and Chelsea College of Fine Arts as part of the nationwide Art is Everywhere series. Projected onto the façade of Tate Britain, the work entered a new public dialogue — transforming from a studio canvas into a shared image, embedded in the city’s cultural landscape. As a London-based British visual artist born in India, I draw inspiration from machines that embody scientific progress and from the ever-expanding limits of human ingenuity. I believe that for humanity to prosper, we must understand how we know what we know, and how we got to where we are. Only then can we rise to the immense challenges we face as a species.
Energy, Machines, and Shared Destiny
The bold palette of orange and yellow in F1 reflects the rising sun of what technology can offer us. In my wider practice, I often look to ambitious machines – such as the Saturn V rocket or the Apollo space program – not only for their aesthetic qualities but for what they represent: cooperation, sacrifice, and shared accomplishment. NeilArmstrong’s words on 20 July 1969 – “Houston, Tranquility Base here. The Eagle has landed” – carried a cheer that united the world in a single moment. To me, this was humanity’s greatest secular ‘religious’ moment, a symbol of what is possible when curiosity, planning, and ingenuity align. That same spirit of collective endeavour is what I seek to evoke in my work.
A Secular Iconography
For me, F1 in Orange and Yellow is more than an abstract painting of movement and velocity – it is part of a conscious effort to articulate a new secular iconography. Like mandalas in Eastern religions, my paintings are meditations: calligraphies of colour and line where I disappear into the moment of brush on canvas. My titles carry deliberate mythological resonance, layering meaning with playful subversion. When projected on Tate Britain, F1 was no longer just an exploration of energy and form, but a symbol of shared destiny – a reminder that our ancestors were pattern-seeking hunter-gatherers, and that same curiosity continues to drive us to imagine, question, and build.
