Her inspiration is drawn from her experiences of navigating the world as a first generation Indian, feminism perspectives, and through constantly learning from her lived mental health experiences. She taps into her extensive educational background in mental health, addictions, and homelessness to create paintings which evoke a sense of wonder and introspection to the viewer. By exploring self expression through equating emotions with colours, shapes, and mediums, she has cultivated a unique hybrid style of painting which incorporates a delicate balance of calculated geometric abstraction and raw emotional free flow. Bright bold shapes, spontaneous lines, and calculated release of different mediums flood across canvases, forming layers of her inner dialogue, articulated as a visual story.
When she paints crisp hard edge geometric compositions, she tends to be in her head with all her thoughts, feelings, and emotion; trying to analyze, reflect, and process her conscious and subconscious experiences. As her stream of thoughts pass along, she subconsciously transfers mentally working through her thoughts into painting onto the canvas. In contrast, when Kaushal paints free flow lines and shapes, she tends to be in a state of flow, experiencing complete immersion within the present moment - euphoria on the canvas. The feeling of being entirely outside of her head, trusting herself completely and simply letting the moment guide her instincts is a liberating and empowering experience.
Embedded in the history and traditions of abstract expressionism, Kaushal’s paintings utilize cathartic techniques and personal symbols to create spontaneous unplanned manifestation of the final compositions; a visual language for the viewer to decipher. The process of picking different tools, methods, techniques, mediums, shapes, and color schemes is something that manifests organically as she continues to work on the painting.
Her belief that art is a strong contender of how we share our thoughts and ideas is a driving force for her creativity. She feels art is a powerful tool that can manifest change on both an individual and societal level; it holds the opportunity to influence beliefs, allowing new ideas to emerge. Just one new idea can change a persons’ perception, inspiring her to continue to create.
Kaushal aims to elicit the question of “why” for the viewer, when interpreting her bold abstract works with the hope that the viewer will transfer this curiosity into their own existence and life purpose.
