Pragati Sharma may have started as an architect in India but found her calling as a painter and conservator of traditional Indian art forms in Sunnyvale, California. During the COVID pandemic, she delved deep into the stories of the Ramayan, embarking on a 60-painting series depicting lesser-known stories of the great Indian epic poem. Pragati has passed her love of Indian myths to her teenage daughter Tiya, 13, and both share their experiences connecting to their Indian heritage.
We Belong is a visual series highlighting different experiences of South Asian and Indian identity. This series was produced by India Currents in collaboration with CatchLight as part of the CatchLight Local CA Visual Desk. Photographs and interviews by CatchLight Fellow Sree Sripathy.
Portraits were made in Sunnyvale, Calif. on Feb. 11, 2023, and the interview took place on June 2, 2023, via Zoom. This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.
Where were you born and raised?
Pragati: I was born in the northern part of India, in the state of Madhya Pradesh (MP) and I grew up also in the Hindi-speaking belt of India. So, I grew up in UP (Uttar Pradesh) and MP. My parents relocated a few times, and I ended up in Bombay for a while. Finally, in Lucknow, I studied for my bachelor’s in architecture. After five years in Lucknow, I went to Ahmedabad, Gujarat, to do my master’s. After traveling a bit around the world, I landed in Connecticut in 2007.
How did you connect to your Indian culture and heritage while in India?
Pragati: I had a very culturally rich upbringing with beautiful exposure to all kinds of arts, any form, performing or visual. I grew up in an environment different from how a typical person in India grows up. I wasn’t aware of it until I came out of that environment.
I grew up in a gated community, where people from all over the country came to work. It was a beautiful amalgamation of different cultures. It had people from the south, it had people from the west, Maharashtra, Bengal, everything. We would celebrate all the festivals, cuisines, traditions, dances, and music, from every part of India. I thought this was normal and only when I went out of that community into college did I realize what I had was so different from others.
My dad worked for BHEL, Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited. It was a government company and my dad is an engineer. So our immediate neighbors could be from Kerala or the family next door could be from Bengal. We would enjoy their cuisine, hear those languages, and see them celebrate their festivals.
When you mentioned traveling around the world, did you do that as a single woman, or after marriage?
Pragati: I did that as a single person, mostly related to work. The idea was, after my design, architecture and art education, I wanted to see Europe. I traveled to Italy, France, and Greece and I worked in Italy for a while.
When you traveled to Europe and lived in Italy did you miss India?
Pragati: I think first when you move out of India, you are looking for how to connect. In Italy, the one thing that stood out for me was how close-knit families are, just like us. Grown-up people still live with their parents, which is very common for us in India.
You get nostalgic after a point and start looking for Indian food, Indian groceries, Indian people, or at least people who look like you. Once you overcome that, you adjust to the food, climate, and the people. You start picking up bits of the language itself, their food, culture, and their life. I started visiting the libraries, the grocery stores, the markets, and things like that, and finally started absorbing the culture there.
How did you meet your husband?
Pragati: I met my husband even before I went to college. We were friends from school. He did his engineering in UP, I did my architecture in a different city. We were always connected. Right after education we got married.
Was coming to the US a culture shock after India and Europe?
Pragati: Europe was very bright and vibrant and there were so many things happening around you. I did not like it in the beginning, in the US. I landed on Christmas Eve. I thought, okay, this is the biggest festival that this country has, so it should look like Diwali right? It should look like how every house is lit up in India. It wasn’t like that and that was a bit of a shock.
Slowly I made friends and then adjusted. It wasn’t that big of a culture shock, because I had lived in Europe and had been with people who were not Indians on my campus. But it was not as exciting in the beginning.
Tiya, where were you born and raised?
Tiya: I was born in Connecticut, Hartford. I lived there for around four years, and then we moved to California.
How do you connect to your Indian culture and heritage?
Tiya: My mom makes Indian dishes. My dad too. And sometimes on the occasional Indian holiday, we celebrate.
Your mom mentioned that you were a fan of Indian culture?
Tiya: I definitely love Indian mythology. So I read a lot of Indian mythology books, and I watch a lot of Indian mythology movies, videos, and sometimes even cartoons.
Do you have a favorite character in these stories?
Tiya: My favorite character would be little Krishna. He’s in this cartoon version and there are these short videos of how Krishna is as a kid. He would do mischievous things, but in the end, he would save the day or help someone, or, you know, spend time in the forest with his friends.
My mom said I would sneak small snacks from the fridge or the pantry like Krishna would sneak butter. I wish I was in that same setting with my friends as Krishna was to play pranks on people. That is something that I wish I could do.
How do you think that you will keep a connection to your culture as you grow older?
Tiya: Nowadays I am speaking a lot of Oriya with my dad and I feel like I am really improving and learning new words, so maybe as I grow older, that will get better. In Hindi, I also really need to improve. Maybe I’d wear some traditional Indian clothing or something like that.
Pragati, tell me how you came to be an artist?
Pragati: I have always painted even when I was a kid. I wanted to carry it forward professionally, but when I came to the U.S., I was not able to work because of the visa situation. So I just kept painting and exploring. At some point, I realized that I’m good at this and can probably make it my profession. Slowly things fell into place. I showed my work to several people and got feedback from art galleries. I’m happy that I took this direction. Although I’m trained as an architect and an industrial designer, I don’t think I would go back to work as one now.
How do you choose your art projects?
Pragati: You can say that it’s a bit of nostalgia that you want to connect with your culture all the time. But that’s all that I know. So that comes very naturally to me, telling stories that are related to India, Indian mythology, and Indian culture. And I think while doing it for many, many years, I finally feel comfortable doing it more. I have explored other stories and other cultures, but I think I just connect with these so much more.
You’re doing a big set of paintings, I think 60, on the Ramayan?
Pragati: I started working on this series during the pandemic. Before that, my paintings used to be smaller bodies of work, a maximum of 10 paintings. They would be connected through a shorter story. Then I finally decided to pick up the Ramayan because I wanted to create a larger body of work. I felt they are the most important stories from India, Ramayan, and Mahabharat. If somebody asked me ‘What will you do next?’ my answer would probably be the Mahabharat, because that’s the natural next step.
I started reading the Valmiki Ramayan from the beginning, the Sanskrit text and its translation. That is when I discovered that there are many things that we don’t know. I realized that there is much more to tell. That was my main intention in doing this series. I want to tell stories which are not so well known.
What is one story that you found that surprised you? Or delighted you?
Pragati: There is one towards the end of Ramayan where Ram is ready to go back to Vaikunt. Hanuman has vowed to protect Ayodhya. He wouldn’t let Ram go back. That is one of my favorite stories because it has a beautiful life lesson at the end. Ram drops his ring in the river, and asks Hanuman to get it from the river bed. Hanuman jumps into the river, but can’t find it. He keeps going to the bottom of the earth and at the bottom of Paatal Lok he finds a mountain of rings. All the rings are identical. He meets Vasuki, the king of snakes, who tells him that in every yug, the phase of time, every era, there is one ring. That is when Hanuman realizes that Ram was trying to teach him a lesson. The idea was that a cycle of life goes on and he shouldn’t try to stop Ram, but let him go because his job on Earth is done.
Is there anything that you miss about India?
Pragati: Probably the street food and being able to shop very easily and just listening to the music all the time. I think it’s just being in India which is so different from being here. There are pros and cons but it’s a beautiful mix of everything.
What do you want people to know about India and Indian culture that they don’t seem to understand?
Pragati: It’s so difficult to tell somebody about India in a short way because the country is full of so many different things, the cuisine, the people, the language, the culture. Everything is so different every 200 kilometers. A person from Gujarat will describe India in a different way than a person from Bengal, UP or Karnataka. I wish people outside of India understood that it is a hugely diverse country, but there are beautiful commonalities. Everybody is welcoming, everybody is so warm. You go to an Indian household, and you cannot leave the house without being invited for a cup of tea. So I think that warmth, and just kindness, those kinds of things, are very nice. Probably you don’t understand them when you meet people first but if you give them a chance, you will probably be best friends with Indians.
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This series was produced by India Currents in collaboration with CatchLight as part of the CatchLight Local CA Visual Desk. Contributors include Vandana Kumar, Meera Kymal, Mabel Jimenez, and Jenny Jacklin-Stratton. Learn more about CatchLight Local’s collaborative model for local visual journalism at https://www.catchlight.io/local
This series was made possible in part by funding provided by the State of California, administered by the California State Library in partnership with the California Department of Social Services and the California Commission on Asian and Pacific Islander American Affairs as part of the Stop the Hate program.