Tosca Lahiri Artist Statement

I am an Indian–Scottish contemporary artist based in the West of Scotland. My paintings explore liminal spaces – thresholds between strength and vulnerability, stillness and movement, science and emotion. Each work carries both immediacy and quiet reflection, offering collectors the opportunity to engage with pieces that hold cultural resonance and lasting value.

Graduating with a First Class BA (Hons) in Fine Art, I was the only student in the history of a well-regarded School of Fine Art – rich in tradition and historical reference – to secure commercial gallery representation while still studying. This early recognition of a distinct voice that combines intellectual rigour with emotional honesty continues to underpin my practice.

In the studio, I approach painting as both enquiry and encounter. Colours, marks, rhythms intuitively beat a pulse through each piece of art. The work is shaped by many years of technical artistic practice, building multi-layered surfaces that are fragile yet assertive. My academic background has long been grounded in the study of language – from analysing stylistics during my English degree to exploring programming languages and database structures within a Computer Science Masters.

This sustained enquiry informs the way I think about painting as a form of communication. Through improvisation, erasure, and gesture, I seek to create a visual language that speaks beyond words, holding tension and release, risk and resolution in equal measure.
While my practice is grounded in formal investigation, it is also informed by lived experience. For me, painting is not only a mode of making but also a way of anchoring presence – transforming unease into clarity. Each completed work becomes both an object of aesthetic reflection and a marker of resilience.

My Indian–Scottish heritage shapes this practice, weaving together perspectives that surface through colour, rhythm, and materiality. It adds layers of identity and resonance that enrich both the making and the encounter with the work.

Through these paintings, I aim to make the intangible tangible, offering collectors an encounter with works that embody originality, cultural depth, and the quiet strength of transformation.