The Open Studio / Harish Sharma
Harish Sharma
Diaspora,
A calf from home rests on a saw above the city
Pale blue sky, the colour of a morning far from the village.
A saw blade, dark as river water, holds a man and a calf.
He looks away from them, chin on his folded arms.
A litchi splits open, pink and wet, falling slowly.
A hoopoe drops with its striped crest down.
Below, the towers lean as if the ground has tilted.
Nobody here knows the calf's name.
The work
Harish Sharma paints himself resting his arms on a huge handsaw. The saw floats above tall city buildings. It stands for the carpentry tools of his ancestors. Around him are memories of rural Bihar: peeled litchis, a sparrow, a hoopoe and a calf the family loved. His family's roots are in Bihar. His father moved to Delhi first to find work. Today the family lives in a home they built in Haryana. Sharma is studying for a Master of Fine Arts in Painting at Jamia Millia Islamia.
In the artist’s words
“This surreal self-portrait captures urban isolation and a longing for home. It merges ancestral carpentry tools with memories of rural Bihar represented by litchis, birds and a beloved calf to explore displacement amidst the concrete city. My understanding of migration is not something I just read about in books. I have lived through it myself.”
- Theme
- Migration and home
- Material
- Acrylic on canvas
- Size
- 91.44 × 152 × 3.81 cm
- Year
- 2025
- Edition
- This painting explores the quiet, persistent ache of the diaspora—the deep emotional pull of a homeland left behind while navigating a new city. It captures that distinct, lingering feeling of memory where your mind constantly drifts back to the familiar streets, the specific sights, and the everyday atmosphere of the place you used to call home. Through its visual layers, the artwork reflects how physical distance cannot sever the roots of where you came from, turning the canvas into a space where nostalgia, longing, and the transition of living between two worlds meet
- Framed
- Yes
- About the artist
- Jamia millia islamia
- From
- Faridabad
- Code
- RC-303
