VIPEKSHA GUPTA     

Transience: Maps of Rupture and Rapture

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An Essay by Ranjit Hoskote
Originally published by Blueprint 12

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August 19 - 27th, 2023, Bikaner House, Blueprint 12,  New Delhi

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“Colour is emptiness; emptiness is colour.”
— François Cheng, Empty and Full

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The Architecture of Impermanence

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Transience animates the core of Vipeksha Gupta’s practice . It is felt as a stream of thoughts pacing through our consciousness, or as memories dissolving back into the flow of time . Paradoxically, Gupta’s large-scale drawings do not present ephemerality . Instead, they stand as robust, commanding visual anchors that confidently challenge the human eye .

Process and Mindfulness: Rooted deeply in early Buddhist concepts of mindfulness (vipassana) and impermanence (Sabbe sankhāra anicca), Gupta’s formal choices reflect a quiet, meditative absorption .

Her focus rests on the shade cerise—a moderate red pushed masterfully to its absolute extremes . The pigment shifts from dense, percussive deep tones into light, translucent veils .Gupta shapes her expansive fields of charcoal and dry pigment using minimalist yet decisive gestures . By incorporating sharp cuts, incisions, and hand-engineered folds, she sets up structural play between shifting penumbras of light and shadow .

Ultimately, her surfaces function as fluctuating screens veined with intimations of a cosmic void . They act simultaneously as a plenum and a void—communicating a living spirit through maps of rupture and rapture