Your name: Shana Sood
You are: I️ am a hopelessly nostalgic dreamer who is as passionate about the mundane things in life as ethereal. I seek to capture what I️ feel - the medium could be drawing, painting, photography or writing. I️ did make two human beings, and love to bring them along on my quest. Fortunately, they both share my love for art!
You can be found at: www.shanasood.com. Here is the thing about my website, it is not up to date but hopefully gives the viewer a representative taste of my work. Additionally, even though it is set up like an online store, I️ am not so keen on selling my art just yet. In my mind my art is still wet clay and I️ need to keep working on it and building it. I️ have opened my world for people to look into, and they are welcome to stop by, have a cup of coffee with me, talk to me about my art, their art, what they envision it may grow into, but I will be perfectly happy keeping my paintings until they have grown….and, I have grown.
Your rituals: Did I say I am hopelessly nostalgic? My most inspirational moments are triggered by visions of me in Delhi (the city where I was born and spent first 25 years of my life, the city that I am reactively over-attached to, after having been separated from it ever since my husband and I decided to move to USA and make a life here). Some cynical friends like to point out that I won’t love the city so much when I have to fight with the neighbors for parking, or deal with pollution, or deal with traffic, predictability of nothing and unpredictability of everything – of course I choose to ignore all these comments and stick to the vision in my head.
Another important trigger is music. Though my playlist has music from all eras of Bollywood (dating back to Mukesh, Mohammad Rafi and Kishore), especially effective in triggering the emotions in me that make me want to be one with art, is Bollywood parallel cinema music from the late 70s and early 80s, think Gulzar + Asha Bhosle + R.D. Burman. A. R. Rehman is another favorite – Bombay movie’s theme… the blank space is my inability to describe what I feel when I hear it.
And of course, it is critical that as an artist who is still learning, I step out of my own narcissistic bubble and study other artists’ work. Two years ago, I went on my Instagram and unfollowed all celebrities and “sacrificed” the pleasure of being able to stay updated on their daily routines and flashy parties. Now I prefer to only follow artists, art galleries and art museums. My daily feed, full of eclectic art, is like inspiration on steroids.
I am a full time working professional and have quite a busy schedule, so I make it point to paint on most evenings. If I am unable to paint, I feel I should at least be surrounded by painting paraphernalia, so I am mentally involved and thinking about what I am going to paint next when I return to my canvas. This is the reason my home office is also my art studio (along with being my bedroom).
My ideal painting environment is me alone in my studio and my favorite music playing in the background. I would love to sip on a hot cup of coffee while I paint but it gives me a stomachache so I stick to adrak-vali chai (ginger tea). I am happy to settle for the next best scenario, painting alongside my husband binge watching Netflix or Amazon Prime. By the way, I have also tried PWI – painting while intoxicated. It’s not a good idea, even though in the moment, you might think you are creating a masterpiece.
Shana Sood: Photo provided by artist.