As someone who grew up in a culture where creative inclinations were taboo, each painting is an act of affirmation—a way of asserting to myself that creating art is not shameful but something primal and inherently spiritual.
Every work comes from a deeply personal place, often as a way to dig deeper into questions that feel urgent at that moment. I spend considerable time sitting, looking, and pondering before approaching the easel. When I begin, I rarely know what the painting will look like, but I do have clarity about the emotion or question driving it.
I work in short, concentrated bursts, letting intuition take over, trying not to judge a mark as right or wrong. The juxtaposition of mathematical elements—grids, circles—with intuitive mark-making using slightly awkward tools like palette knives and large brushes is my way of honoring and integrating both the logical and the creative without repressing either.
I explore recurring questions: What does it mean to hold multiple, often contradictory identities at once? My paintings investigate this through fragmented figures, overlapping spaces, and layers that accumulate like memory—some marks visible, others buried, all of them present. I'm interested in liminality—the threshold spaces where we're neither fully one thing nor another.
In the end, I hope my work leaves viewers with ambiguity and space to engage with their own simultaneous truths, the different masks they wear, and their own path toward integration.
Pragya's work explores liminal spaces, colliding realities and the search for identity—what it means to live in perpetual transition, never quite feeling rooted in any single world. Her art asks: is it even possible to unmask, cross a threshold and feel with certainty, "this is who I am"?
Born in a small town in India in a culture where creative pursuits were strictly forbidden, Pragya's journey took her to Philadelphia for an MBA at Wharton, then to London for a career in finance, and she eventually found her calling in art. She now lives in Philadelphia.
Her work invites viewers to reflect on the paradoxical tensions we all navigate: the security of a career we know versus the not-so-quiet whispers of another calling, the familiar masks we wear versus the unsettling journey of discovering who we truly are.
Pragya studied at The Art Students League of New York, NYC Crit Club, and Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts. She has exhibited internationally, including at Bristol Art Museum (RI), Waterworks Art Museum (MT), Lloydminster Museum (Canada), San Diego Museum of Contemporary Art (CA), and Customs House Museum (TN).
2020 - 2024
The Art Students League of New York
• Advanced Drawing and Painting
2019 - 2020
Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts
• Fundamental coursework in visual arts
2012 - 2014
The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania
• MBA – Masters in Business Administration
2026
The Places we Carry, Cope House Gallery, Philadelphia, PA, USA
2024
As a New Leaf Trembles, Manayunk-Roxborough Art Center, Philadelphia, PA, USA
2026
Mark and Meaning, Customs House Museum, Clarksville, TN, USA
2025
Annual Juried Show, Cerulean Gallery, Philadelphia, PA, USA
Rock-Paper-Scissors, Bristol Art Museum, Bristol, RI, USA
Something Nostalgic, 46th Annual Juried Exhibition, Waterworks Art Museum, Miles City, MT, USA
2024
Fine Art Show, Lloydminster Museum, Lloydminster SK, Canada
Imagination and Play, Abington Art Center, PA, USA
Prism – Connections in Color, Strathmore Mansion, North Bethesda, MD, USA
2023
Interiors and Exteriors, The New York Boyer Foundation, New York, NY, USA
International Juried Show, San Diego Museum of Contemporary Art Guild, San Diego, CA, USA
Juried by Hugh M. Davies, Director of Museum of Contemporary Art
Annual Juried Show, Bowery Gallery, New York, NY, USA
Online Juried Show, The American Artists Professional League Associate, New York, NY, USA
Works on Paper, Philadelphia Sketch Club, Philadelphia, PA, USA
2022
Breaking Through – The Rise of American Women Artists, Customs House Museum, Clarksville, TN, USA
2021
Student Show, The Art Students League of New York, New York, NY, USA
2020
157th Small Oil Paintings, Philadelphia Sketch Club, Philadelphia, PA, USA
2024
Still life, Lloydminster Museum, Lloydminster SK, Canada
1st Place Award
Most Compelling Interpretation of Theme Award, Abington Art Center, Jenkintown, PA, USA
2025
Mark and Meaning, Customs House Museum, Clarksville, TN, USA
2024
A 7,948-mile Journey from Finance to Fine Art, Chestnut Hill Local, Philadelphia, PA, USA
Imagination and Play, Show Catalog, Abington Art Center, Jenkintown, PA, USA
2023
Associate Artist Members Show Catalog, The American Artists Professional League, New York, NY, USA
2021
Breaking Through – The Rise of American Women Artists, Customs House Museum, Clarksville, TN, USA
