Domingo Zapata Studios hosted “HOLD ME,” a group exhibition featuring the work of artists Radhika Gupta-Buckley (India), Evelyne Drouot (France), Joaquin Avila (Cuba), and Domingo Zapata (Spain) in Manhattan’s Greenwich Village last night at Ideal Glass Studios. The show celebrated community, creativity, and collaboration, the thread stitching these diverse artists together.
Some notable guests of the exhibition included Edwin Hodge (Actor, The Purge Franchise), Antoine Verglas (Photographer), Kelly Hughes (Model), Amber Wang (Model), Jessica Val Ortiz (Content Creator), Malik Roberts (Artist) and Vernon O’Meally (Artist).
A one-night-only event, the “HOLD ME” exhibition honored the creative spark of New York City. The shift and transformation of the art scene over the past decade have pulled artists from every corner of the world to Downtown Manhattan, leading to the inevitable collaboration of these artists, sharing each other’s cultures and expanding the possibilities for their art to reach.
Domingo Zapata comments on the artists he rallied to be a part of the exhibition and why he chose them, “I selected these artists as a collective because their work evokes what I call sensation memory. It is visual storytelling that transcends time and space while bringing you into their own distinctive world,” Zapata continues, “Radhika examines the ongoing struggles of Indian women and peoples but with a unique, explosive approach to color. While it is specific, it speaks to global conversations for so many right now.”
Radhika Gupta-Buckley is a New York Based artist of Indian origin. She has been painting since she was six years old, though her early career path started at Oxford, where she obtained a Law Degree. She practised law at the Indian Supreme Cort and the UN in The Hague. She reverted to her calling to art, frustrated by the bureaucratic barriers that caused pain, suffering, and injustice. Radhika now educates, informs, and enlightens people on cultural issues with her art shaped around gender bias, sexuality, race, and prejudice across nations and cultures. Radhika’s art is inspired by Indian art history. She uses saturated colors and bold patterns seen last night. Her art speaks to the human condition across multiple cultures and aims for it to be a voice for the silenced and oppressed.
Radhika says her favorite pieces from her collection were Squad and Be there in five. Two large gouache canvases depict how strong women are, their spirits unwavering no matter how hard life hits them and tries to stop them from rising. Check out more of Radhika’s art and life on her Instagram, @grumpstagram.
Zapata concludes, “I think their human connection feeds their art. It is so beautiful. In a world of transactional relationships, they are true friends that have created a necessary support system for one another. Each of them creates work where the focus feels not like an object but a subject that is a part of each and every one of us.”
