ABOUT / CV

Ravi Arupa / A Postmodern Primitive

What is the explanation of the seemingly insane drive of man to be painter and poet if it is not an act of defiance against man's fall and an assertion that he return to the Garden of Eden? For the artists are the first men. —Barnett Newman

In 1951, Ravi Arupa was born on a small farm in Mariana, Arkansas, USA. His parents were sharecroppers during the Jim Crow era, a period of racial segregation and neo-slavery. In April, there was the smell of honeysuckle and the sound of cackling hens. The cotton fields extended and curled into a powder blue horizon. The flight of the dragonfly was an unusual phenomenon. Birds flying in a V formation were amazing to behold. During the long summer months, hummingbirds were commonplace. He admired their ability to hover. His aunt’s garden sustained a variety of fruits, vegetables, and huge sunflowers that were awe-inspiring. The garden attracted a variety of insects and small animals, such as rabbits, raccoons, and the occasional snake. All these images inspired him to draw from life.

In 1962, he moved with his family to the South Side of Chicago, Illinois. During this time, John Coltrane and Rahsaan Roland Kirk’s music had a profound influence on his consciousness. John Coltrane’s "A Love Supreme" was a mantra. The entire album was a tribute to Godhead, the spiritual cosmos. Rahsaan Roland Kirk’s LP "I Talked to the Spirits" [track 7] was a cerebral dialectic between being and non-being.

Later in the 1960s, at age sixteen, he found images of Richard Hunt's sculptures in a Chicago newspaper. It was emotionally uplifting to know about the success of an African-American artist. Hunt's abstract formalism inspired him on the pathway to a creative life.

He became interested in painting during my tenure in elementary school. While in high school, I became interested in the object found (objet trouvé). At age twenty, he became interested in photography. Later, in the 1970s, sculpture became his focus while working at a furniture manufacturing company (HP Systems Ltd.). I realized that utilitarian objects, like furniture, were devoid of the gallery or museum environment. He realized that galleries and museums actually pigeonholed objects as art and an elitist activity.

He became interested in art history, art theory, and visual anthropology. The erudition gave him an understanding of art in Africa and Oceanian societies. He realized that art in society naturally creates and defines reality through performance, which could be in the form of singing, remembering a dream, choreographing a dance, or taking a deep breath. Intuition became the eye of creativity. He concluded that a dancer's movement was more important than the choreography. He became aware that in the natural world, things ostensibly decay and/or morph. In the sphere of creativity, consciousness has less relevancy.

He read two books that confirmed many of his dreams: the ancient Chinese book called The Tao Te Ching (The Book of the Way and its Virtue), theoretically composed by a sixth-century B.C. philosopher called Lao Tzu. It teaches that every end is a beginning or a continuum; therefore, there is no opposition in nature. In "The Critique of Pure Reason," written by Emmanuel Kant, the 18th-century philosopher asserted that time and space were not constituents of the physical realm. He believed that time and space were epiphenomenons of the mind.

Curriculum Vitae

Education

2005 BA, Columbia College Chicago, Chicago, IL

Major: Art and Design, concentrating in the Fine Arts

Minor: Art History

Curated Exhibitions

2024 Potential Energy: Chicago Puppets Up Close, Chicago Cultural Center, Chicago, IL

ReSource: Art and Resourcefulness in Black Chicago, The Southside Art Community Center,

Chicago, IL

2023 The 6th Annual 12 x 12 Show, Elephant Room Gallery, Chicago, IL

2022 The 5th Annual 12 x 12 Show, Elephant Room Gallery, Chicago, IL

2019 Through A Dog's Eyes, A Multimedia Exhibition, Manifest, Columbia College Chicago, Chicago, IL

Juried Exhibitions

2018 47th Annual Black Creativity Art Exhibition, Museum of Science and Industry, Chicago, IL

2017 46th Annual Black Creativity Art Exhibition, Museum of Science and Industry, Chicago, IL

Blick's 12th Annual 12 x 12 Show, Blicks Chicago Loop, Chicago, IL

2010 Chicago Art Open, River East Art Center, Chicago, IL

2009 38th Annual Black Creativity Art Exhibition, Museum of Science and Industry, Chicago, IL

2008 Lillstreet Art Center’s 5th Annual Member Sale, Chicago, IL

2007 Chicago Art Open, Iron Studios, Chicago, IL

2005 The Grand Design, Fine Art BFA Exhibition, Glass Curtain Gallery, Columbia College

Chicago, Chicago, IL

Commission / Public Art

2025 Sleeping Mask #2 (Graphite drawing), Sponsored by the National Public Housing Museum,

Chicago, IL

2024 Flight of the Butterflies (Mixed-media sculpture), Marovitz Suvanna Natural Area, Montrose Harbor,

Chicago, IL Produced by the Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum, Chicago, IL

Publications

2024 Flight of the Butterflies, Chicago Sun Times, Chicago, IL

Chicago Reader, A Look at the Work of Red Line Service Artists, Chicago IL

Awards and Honors

2003 11th Annual Hokin Honors Exhibition, Columbia College Chicago, Chicago, IL

Collections

Hiromi, musician, Hamamatsu, Japan

Saper Law Offices, Chicago, IL

Private Collections

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Ravi Arupa / A Postmodern Primitive