Catalogue / Aakansha Gupta
See it on a wall
Shown at true size: 30 × 18 cm. The person is about 170 cm tall. Every work is shown whole, never cropped.
Aakansha Gupta
Shelter on the roof
A whole household carried up to the roof as the water rose
A brick house stands to its windows in blue.
On the roof, bundles sit close, tied and heavy, the colour of wet earth.
The water is glass-bright and streaked, as if it is still moving.
Its green rim curls over like foam about to break.
The wave lifts high on one side and holds.
Nothing falls. Everything waits up here, where it is still dry.
The work
Aakansha Gupta was a child when a flood came into her family's home in Kishanganj, Bihar. The family carried bags, mattresses and food up to the roof. Here a small brick house holds that load. Gupta builds it by hand in stoneware and fires it at a high heat. The house is matte and earth coloured. A glossy blue wave curls around it. In the kiln the glazes on the house run in ways she did not plan. They leave marks like those a flood leaves on a wall.
In the artist’s words
“I don't remember everything clearly. I mainly remember how suddenly we had to move our things upstairs. The terrace became our last safe place. That image stayed in my mind. Our normal domestic life suddenly moved outside. Allowing the kiln to have its own voice was essential to representing natural chaos.”
Not for sale
Shown with the artist’s permission. This work is not for sale.
- Theme
- Refuge from a flood
- Material
- Glazed ceramic
- Size
- 30.48 × 17.78 × 35.56 cm
- Year
- 2025
- About the artist
- Visva Bharati University
- From
- KISHANGANJ
- Code
- RC-8529
- @aakanshha7
