Dialing a Digital Devotion

ARTIST STATEMENT

I create paintings in reaction to the events and ideas of an ever-converging global landscape. Much like an author, I like to create a visual plot line for my subject matter. My paintings are visual representations that draw from international conflicts, the intersection of technology in daily life, the role of religious tension and human rights in politics, and the progress of clean tech and alternative energy. In my process, I juxtapose imagery and discrete ideas to create new synergy as well as contribute to the visual culture. In my studio process, the juxtapositions of imagery, ideas and technology are reflective of my intellectual interests, including social art and its discontents, authorship and post-production, and entrepreneurship.

In "Dialing a Digital Devotion," I explore the concept of “Digital Circuit Boards—Walls & Fabrics,” based on the painting called “The Digital Muse”, a mixed media painting of three women standing at a bridge with a wall made of a circuit board. In the sky, there is a pattern in the layout of the digital circuit board, threaded with beads. It combines digital technology, which is often a source of jobs for H-1B recipients with a connection to the South Asian motifs of embroidered clothes, temples and bathing in ancient waters. This wall of the “circuit board” represents the source of economic opportunity and stability, but also partition. The concept of a connected circuit links the South Asian homeland as both strengthened by technology, as well as divided, separated as a wall.
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VERU NARULA is a visual artist focused on globally conscious paintings and the intersection between the representational, digital, and traditional oil media. He learned to paint as an adolescent from his parents and went on to study more formally at Columbia University and the School of Visual Arts. Veru's work has been included in exhibitions at many cultural institutions, including the Queens Museum of Art, the Hammond Museum, Exit Art, Santa Monica Art Studios, Tarnish & Gold Gallery, the Elizabeth Arts Foundation, and James Cohen Galley. His work has received reviews in the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times and India Abroad, and is included in several private collections, including the Rubin’s Museum of Art. Learn more about Veru's work at www.verunarula.com