After leaving her law career, Radhika Gupta-Buckley expressed feeling slightly useless in the fight against injustice and inequality in India, but her artwork would change that.
Inspired by different cultures around the globe, Gupta-Buckley is a lawyer turned artist focused on female empowerment and changing the status quo.
Growing up in India, Gupta-Buckley began painting at the age of six, but it was her time working in the Indian Supreme Court and the UN that led her to explore creating art as a career. She calls her work “a secret language I would use to communicate with myself.”
After her first exhibition in 2017, she found the confidence and inspiration she needed. She has since shown her work in seven exhibits, including Art Basel in Miami, Florida, and in her first solo show later this year in LA.
After giving birth to her son in September 2021, Gupta-Buckley jumped back in, showing artwork only a month later. She says her son inspires her daily and often speaks out about her other motivators, including the beauty of India, her travels, her grandfather who also pursued a law career, and strong women from Maya Angelou to Rihanna.
It is clear that Gupta-Buckley is focused on working against oppression. Her greatest goal is “To be India’s greatest living female artist renowned for work that supports and champions women too often not seen and not heard.”
What she felt she couldn’t do with a legal career, she strives to achieve as an artist.
“I was deeply frustrated by the bureaucratic barriers to facilitating change as a lawyer, so I reverted back to art to inform, educate, and enlighten on cultural issues, from equality, gender bias, sexuality, race, and prejudice across nations and cultures. I aim to use art to be a voice for the silenced and oppressed.”
A few of the cultural issues she finds most prominent include gender and race bias, inequality, and prejudice.
She considers one of her most recent collections, titled Technicolor Dream, to be “a balance between colorful seduction and informed debate.”
Each of the bright, highly detailed pieces takes about four weeks to complete. The collection features women of color and intricate rainbow backgrounds.
Another collection of hers, Faces of India, highlights gay rights and women’s rights in India. While Gupta-Buckley aspires to evoke joy through these pieces, she also hopes to spread awareness of different forms of oppression and multiple marginalized groups.
Radhika Gupta-Buckley currently lives in Manhattan, NYC, with her husband and son. Check out her work at radhikagupta.art or on Instagram @grumpstagram.
Her next group showing is in Schloss Gorne, Berlin, in July, and her next solo show is at Band of Vices in Los Angeles in September.
Gupta-Buckley’s work is available for commission here.
