Visual Artist — New Delhi / Kolkata, India

CV

Rupa Paul is a Kolkata-born visual artist working between New Delhi and Kolkata, with a sustained field-based engagement in Ladakh. Working across drawing, moving image, photography, performative gesture, installation, artist books and site-responsive processes, her practice examines how memory and history persist through bodies, objects, landscapes and domestic spaces as the contexts that once held them begin to recede.

Personal and familial archives often become points of departure for wider questions of inheritance, labour, gender, ecology, disappearance and the ways memory is transmitted, altered and carried forward.

Education

2002
M.V.A., Printmaking
Government College of Art & Craft, Kolkata
1999
B.V.A., Painting
Government College of Art & Craft, Kolkata

Selected Projects

2020–ongoing
BAPI: What Remains Before Disappearing
Site-responsive project — drawing, archive, photography, performative gesture, moving image, projection and domestic architecture
2024–26
Rewoven
Single-channel moving image, 9 min 40 sec
2024–2026
A Study of a Gesture
Moving image / performance, 2 min 41 sec
2025–ongoing
Kone Main Chup Karke Baito / Sit Quietly in the Corner
Moving image, performance, drawing and installation
2022–ongoing
The Spine Remembers / The Labyrinth Returns
Large-scale drawing series
2025–ongoing
To Mend What Does Not Return
Drawing, performance for camera and moving image
2022–ongoing
Still/Life
Photographic and performative image series
2020–ongoing
Lived Book: A Collective Diary
Artist book project

Grants & Support

2026
BAPI: What Remains Before Disappearing, includes the Foundation Project titled BAPI: An Archaeology of Design Memory. This Foundation Project is implemented by India Foundation for the Arts (IFA), under the Arts Practice – Explorations Programme, 2026.

Selected Exhibitions & Screenings

2026
Rewoven — 18th Short Film Festival Showcase, Kriti Film Club, Alliance Française de Delhi, New Delhi, India
2025
Kone Main Chup Karke Baito / Sit Quietly in the Corner — presented within Raqs Media Collective's installation As Tranquil as Can Be, curated by Vidya Shivadas as part of Scores in Transit: Resonances of the Plural, Serendipity Arts Festival, Panaji, Goa, India
2024
10th Silk Road International Art Exhibition, Xi'an University of Architecture and Technology / Shaanxi Provincial Art Museum, China
2023
9th Silk Road International Art Exhibition, Xi'an University of Architecture and Technology / Shaanxi Provincial Art Museum, China
2018
Viswaroopa — Form of the Universe, 51st Annual Exhibition, Birla Academy of Art & Culture, Kolkata, India — curated by Johnny ML
2017
Contemporary Art of India, Art Penza, Russia
2017
4th Silk Road International Art Exhibition, Xi'an University of Architecture and Technology / Shaanxi Provincial Art Museum, China
2017
Art ONE @ AVANI, contemporary art exhibition — curated by Murali Cheeroth
2016
2nd Pulau Ketam International Art Festival, Malaysia
2016
3rd Silk Road International Art Festival, Xi'an University of Architecture and Technology / Shaanxi Provincial Art Museum, China
2016
9th International Sculpture & Painting Festival, Penza, Russia
2015
2nd Silk Road International Art Exhibition, Xi'an University of Architecture and Technology / Shaanxi Provincial Art Museum, China
2010
Contemporary Art Show, Art Konsult Gallery, New Delhi, India
2010
Creating Common Wealth, Ragini Art Gallery, New Delhi, India
2009
Harvest, Stainless Gallery, New Delhi, India — curated by Arushi Arts
2009
Big Dreams, Crimson Art Gallery, Bangalore, India
2009
Entity, M.E.C. Art Gallery, India Habitat Centre, New Delhi, India
2008
The Sun Rises in the East, Christian Hosp Galerie, Austria — curated by Dr. Alka Pande
2008
Live Wire, Visual Arts Centre, Hong Kong — curated by Bhavna Kakkar
2008
Sandwich, Stainless Gallery, New Delhi, India
2007
Obscure Object of Desire, OED Gallery, Kochi, India — curated by Johnny ML
2007
Images / Urban / Neon, 1 × 1 Art Gallery, Dubai, UAE
2007
Cityscape & Landscape, Art Pilgrim Gallery, New Delhi, India
2007
Y.E.A.H. — The World We Live In, Melbourne, Australia
2006
Images, Plays & Stories: Works by Four Contemporary Women Artists, Anant Art Gallery, New Delhi, India — curated by Anoop Kamath
2005
Eternal Recurrence, works by seventeen contemporary artists, New Delhi, India
2004
10th All India Art Exhibition, State Lalit Kala Academy, Lucknow, India
2002
44th National Exhibition of Art, Lalit Kala Akademi, New Delhi, India
2002
Exhibition, Birla Academy of Art & Culture, Kolkata, India
2001
43rd National Exhibition of Art, Lalit Kala Akademi, New Delhi, India

Awards

2000
Award in Printmaking, Government College of Art & Craft, Kolkata
1999
Prof. Atul Bose Award in Painting, Government College of Art & Craft, Kolkata
1997
Award in Printmaking, Government College of Art & Craft, Kolkata