Shachi Kale

We spoke with Shachi Kale about healing with art, wisdom from the Bhagavad Gita, and the female journey.

- Brenna Lilly

Your art captures the complexity of the human—and more specifically female—life cycle beautifully. How has your artistic practice supported you through your own life’s journey? 

My art is largely a reflection of both my innermost thoughts and conversations with myself as well as my journey as a woman. I started expressing my journey through art only after I moved to the US over 20 years ago and found myself lonely, adrift, and losing myself. While everything looked great on the outside, on the inside I was struggling and found a great sense of release in trying to capture those feelings in art.

When I look back on those first paintings, I can see the haunted loneliness in them. My later series of works capturing my early years in America were more intentional and helped me process in detail all the emotions I had felt 20 years ago. In a surprising way, putting that experience down on paper helped me release the ghost. I’ve captured my early years as a mother, my inner conflicts and emotions, and quiet moments from my daily life. All these have helped me make sense of the world around me and my place in it. 

When, how, and why did you start your artistic practice?

I came to the realization that I was an artist very early in life. I remember knowing at age 4 that art brought me alive and made me feel most myself. Having said that, I studied to be a graphic designer and worked in the world of advertising and design for over 25 years. It was only after the pull to make art got too great, and my children were a little older, that I started leaning into it.