Prastāvanā
Once upon a time… Long, long ago, In the far lands of… Each story comes with its own beginning, sometimes generic, sometimes offbeat. This story starts with a humble preface. This exhibition is a prologue to the chapters of the future that the artist envisions for herself. Rajlakshmi Jadhav’s story begins like any other, with hands moulding, shaping the present, navigating the curveballs of life. Pursuing something inherent and dormant to the contemporary tendencies of exhibition, this show focuses on the agency of the storytelling and the ‘hands’ that draft the ideas. The works engage with explorations of various themes and materials. Her artistic practice, rooted in lived experiences, meanders through snippets of mythologies, indigenous practices, dialectics of the real and the unreal, the natural and the constructed. With the opening note of the show, ‘Of Invisible Hands’ take a glance at the artist’s work which makes a poignant message on the absence of a choice, themes of separation from an imagined reality, and perhaps, subtly, on the definition of ‘agency’ itself. The works like Kaali (2020), Mrigtrishna (2021), and a few others underline how the artist exclaims without pomp, with just a few correctly placed visuals. The second note of the “Prastävanä”, ‘The Play of the Limbs; Hands or Wings(?)’ allows the viewer to take a glance at the artist situating herself at the cusp of the conflict, waiting to take a flight, waiting to show her hand at the table. Engaging with digital art practices through the works like Nightscapes 1 & 2(2020), this section of the show acts as an intermediate stage of her investigative abilities. The third note ‘Through the Minds, Through the Hands’ marks a turning point in her practice, which deliberates on silent expression of herself, through her favourite books and movies, causes that are close to her heart, and people that have made her. In the process of becoming, the artist transforms into a self- critiquing mechanism that revisits, interrogates the past, and seeks closure. No longer restricted by a single medium, artworks like Nostalgia (2020), Corona Pandemic (2021), and Reflection on Body Image (2025) showcase use of every tool at her hand to express herself. The fourth and final note in this show is titled ‘Mind, Memory, and Material: An Ongoing Dialogue’, with artworks like Garden of Mind (2026), it gives a subtle nod to the playful exploration of Mud as a nostalgic material of significance to the artist herself. These notes, throughout the exhibition showcase an intuitive storytelling streak of the artist as a prologue for the adventures and experiences which lie ahead of her. These themes offer a non-linear viewing experience, making the chronology of the paintings and use of specific concepts as a series obsolete. It is a preamble of an arduously adventurous journey translated onto a visual medium. The exhibition takes up a curiously experimentative approach to the display as it attempts to view every artwork, every narrative, as a thing that the artist wants to treat, to release herself from the memories, from the tentacles of the past. It is a clinical examination attempting to frame herself, the past and the present, for her hand in furthering the narratives that no longer suit her. “Prastävanä” is neither an overzealous demonstration of her past works, nor an underestimation of the beginning of an art journey. It becomes a quiet reclamation of her voice, her agency, and her space amidst the chaos. This story, thus, begins with closing the book on her numerous lives till now.
-Jyotirmayee Namjoshi