Create! Mag is excited to share the work of New Delhi, India-based artist Vinita Adhikari. She is a fashion designer who every now and then loves to turn to the canvas to paint. After having grown up in Nainital, a lovely hill-station with a bean-shaped lake, the artist moved to Delhi and studied design at the National Institute of Fashion Technology. In 2011, she launched her fashion brand ILK by Shikha & Vinita with her friend. Since then, she’s continued working both in art and fashion. Her paintings and art prints are the outcome of the years of work put into art during her free time.

From the artist about her current series Lockdown Stories:

Days turning to weeks rolling over to months, the pandemic paused our lives like never before. Stuck in our homes reeling in our anxieties, lockdowns became our new normal.

This body of work was born out of the immune response of my mind to boredom while my body was dealing with manufacturing antibodies to fight the virus.

For some people the lockdown was hard. The physical spaces shrunk while the sense of time blurred. For me, it brought about a strange sense of freedom. I was free from the chatter of routine. I took to my colors and canvas, and friends in the confines of their spaces became my subjects.

While making this work, I realized how laughter and board games returned to the otherwise deserted living room. Waking up in the morning without an alarm clock with furry friends was such an underrated luxury. Just being by yourself with a book and a coffee and having absolutely no agenda for the day can be so astonishingly therapeutic.

Slow is just so beautiful. It made me observe. The most joyous experiences lie lurking in the smallest most ordinary things, we just need a childlike spark to find them.