Alter Ego- Mixed Media Painting by Chandrika Marla

The Beverly Arts Center is currently presenting a show by painter Chandrika Marla. Marla is originally from India and her work explores ideas of self-image and relationships. Her background is originally in fashion design, a fact made very evident in the work in her show "Alter-Ego". Her paintings incorporate vibrant depictions of garments and dresses on neutral toned backgrounds to exemplify ideas of a loss of body or the loss of self. All of the images incorporate empty garments floating in a space signifying a loss of self. According to Marla, the importance and use of the clothes and fabrics are pay with the idea of putting on a "social skin" akin to the act of putting on clothes every morning. She uses the paintings to empress upon the audience the idea of people today, covered in what is not their real skin, continually impressed by outside world to make us into something that we wouldn't actually be. Her paintings incorporate the images of clothing which she creates using techniques gained during her fashion career but she also uses imagery of buildings and structures that she remembers from her time growing up in New Dehli, which can sometimes be scene in the background of the images.

"Alter Ego" will be up at The Beverly Arts Center through March 10th, 2013.

http://chandrikamarla.com/home.html