Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Maya Varadaraj . We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.
Hi Maya , appreciate you sitting with us today to share your wisdom with our readers. So, let’s start with resilience – where do you get your resilience from?
I grew up in a family of resilient and empowered women. My mother, grandmothers, aunts, and sisters have all overcome personal and societal obstacles that have inspired me to live my truest life. As a visual artist, I honour this legacy by creating paintings that highlight these values while maintaining the complexities of what it means to be a woman.
Appreciate the insights and wisdom. Before we dig deeper and ask you about the skills that matter and more, maybe you can tell our readers about yourself?
I shifted my artistic practice to focus on painting in 2020. I began telling my history visually. Painting from family photographs that I had collected over the years. During the pandemic, and during a time of great personal loss, painting brought me comfort. It felt like the only way I could truly express myself.
I was pleasantly surprised when people started relating to my work. Something I felt was so personal and confined to my experiences. I didn’t feel so alone anymore, and my work became a form of therapy for me.
Conversations and community are the most fulfilling aspects of my career. I feel most accomplished when my work evokes memories from a diverse audience; when a stranger can share a story about their grandparents with me because of a detail in one of my paintings.
I am continuing to develop my practice and look forward to a quiet year of introspection and productivity.
If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?
1.) When in doubt, research – whenever I experience creative blocks, I lean into my research to guide me and offer new insights.
2.) Setting realistic goals – my work is so subjective that objectivity and structure become crucial to success. I set small weekly, and monthly goals that help me stay on track for the year. it’s a marathon, not a sprint is a great reminder for me. I also find that being organized with these goals and tracking them helps me maintain my enthusiasm, energy, and confidence.
3.) Nothing should be too serious – sometimes my work can feel heavy and complex. It’s important for me to strike a balance between seriousness and humour. This might mean stepping away from the work and doing something different or approaching it from an alternative perspective. It keeps me light and in flow.
What do you do when you feel overwhelmed? Any advice or strategies?
I allow myself to feel overwhelmed because I know there will be glorious moments of calm and clarity after it passes. I always remind myself of verses from Rainer Maria Rilke’s poem “Go to the Limits of Your Longing” :
“Let everything happen to you: beauty and terror.
Just keep going. No feeling is final”
I also write to clarify the specificities of my discomfort so I can give meaning and reason to them. Once I solidify them I can confront them and move on.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.m-vara.com
- Instagram: @maya-vara
Image Credits
Armani Prosper The Wassaic Project
