Aarti Zaveri identifies herself as an artist of the earth. And also she believes that the earth belongs to all. Taking the homocentric view to a different plane, Aarti functions as an artist of the inclusive world view. This perspective has helped her to move from a studio based art practitioner to an artist who could conjure up artistic projects in any given context transcending linguistic as well as geographical limits. Her creative verve has helped her to evolve into a worth reckoning site specific artist, video artist, installation artist and a performance artist, whose performances take their final form in the videos that she produces.

Born in Gujarat, one of the prosperous states in India, Aarti spent her childhood days among academicians and other family members who were inclined to art and design. She joined the illustrious Faculty of Fine Arts. Aarti kept her creative embers stoked up till they found fruition later in Delhi as she started her studio practice in early 1990s. Her graphic skills directed her initially towards making naturalist paintings which in fact had consolidated her position as an artist as she could gain commissions from the Indian Army and the Government of India to do official portraits of the Martyrs who had been conferred with the topmost gallantry awards.

Aarti however had a different calling as she grew tired of her super-naturalist style, and she directed herself to a semi-figurative and largely abstract style in her paintings where she dealt more with cosmic ideas related to human transcendence than the mundane subjects that an artist of her skill and craft would like to pursue. Oscillating between pure abstraction and semi-figuration, Aarti soon found her foothold in a painterly style which launched her into the second phase of her creative career. This naturally led her to extend her medium from the two dimensional ones to three dimensional. Instead of getting into sculpting, Aarti trasported her painterly thoughts into object based assemblages which slowly became autonomous installations. Adding kinetic and mobile appendages to her installations, she turned them into a sort of interactive installations.

She was the Vice President of the Green Aesthetic Organisation called ‘Trees’. This was a turning point for Aarti as she could bring herself to deal with natural objects sourced directly from the environments. This helped her go beyond the limitations posed by the objects in the artificially controlled situations; she realised that any object discarded or revered has an intrinsic aesthetical value and the artist’s job is to identify it and bring it back to the visual linguistic parlance. Once brought back in that way these objects, irrespective of their collection points, prove themselves as syllables that seek meaning in any kind of a language or system. Sometimes these objects, as Aarti observes, deconstruct an existing system and give birth to a new visual ensemble. Sooner than later Aarti realised her flourish in this language and its ability to express closer to heart ideas.

Taking a lot of inspiration from nature and the philosophies born out of nature, Aarti finds the similarities between feminine creativity and the feminine attributes of nature. At the same time she also recognises the ferocious power embedded within the feminine which could any time position itself as ‘feministic’ and ‘feminine’. The site specific installations that Aarti has done so far have got the early fruit gatherer’s simplicity and purposefulness. The genderless objects become gendered and the apparently powerless objects become powerful in such gathering. The meanings are slowly induced to the ensembles thus she creates and in turn the creations assume powerful messages pertaining to mindless development, conservation of water, fresh air and resources. Without being overtly sentimental towards the environmental issues, Aarti is able to keep a calm approach in framing the issues in an aesthetical fashion.

In the videos that Aarti has done so far, she becomes a protagonist/narrator whose perspective and actions come as interventions in the dominant discourses regarding women’s position and subjection. The protagonist at times turns herself into a narrator as well as the narrated. She becomes the text as well as the reader. This mutuality functions as a double mirror reflection that repeats endlessly creating the necessary depth and abstraction, while the meaning of the apparent remains powerfully conveyed to the viewers. Aarti’s artistic journey is now international and her installations and videos are selected for various international art expos.