"Rituals of Devotion"

The solo Art Show of IMAGINE

With Special Guest Straight from LA

WOES on the turntables

Rituals of Devotion series looks back at Imagine’s immigration journey that spanned over a decade. On each of the paintings in this series, she wrote the name of one of the many immigrations forms she filled out. The names were always a random mix of letters and numbers like 1040-A or I-120A, which were often intimidating codes impossible to understand. But after repeatedly dealing with the forms over ten years, Imagine sees these immigration procedures similar to strict religious practices.

For Imagine and many immigrants, their immigration procedures become rituals of devotion in hopes for a better life. Imagine thought it was only fitting to frame Mantras in hand sewn silk brocades, similar to the ones sewn around traditional religious thangka paintings Imagine grew up seeing in Kathmandu Nepal. The colors on each painting coincides with an outfit Imagine’s mother wore during a celebration Imagine missed at home in Kathmandu.

Bio:

IMAGINE (aka Sneha Shrestha) is a Nepali artist who incorporates her native language and meshes the aesthetics of Sanskrit scriptures with Newari influences. She has shown her meditative works in several exhibitions, commissioned works and public walls around the world from Kathmandu to Boston.

Her show “Mindful Mandalas” was on view at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Her newest work is a thirty-foot sculpture commissioned by the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum currently on view. She was recognized by WBUR as one of the 25 millennial artists of color impacting Boston. Shrestha’s work is held in the private collections of Facebook, Google and Fidelity Investments.

Sneha received her Master’s from Harvard University. Besides creating larger than life murals and paintings, Sneha passionately supports Asian art by working as the Arts Program Manager at the South Asia Institute at Harvard.