BELONGING
PROJECT ROOM
Exhibition dates : 2 - 14 June 2026
Opening reception : Wed 3 June 2026, 6:00 - 8:30pm
BELONGING The world of an emotional, spiritual, and creative homecoming
Born from my earlier exhibition, Two Worlds Collide, where identity and culture stood at the core, Belonging is a deeply personal tribute an artist’s return to the heart and soul of their creative path. To belong is to embrace the essence of who we are, both as humanists and as artists. In this exhibition, attendees will journey through each artist’s unique expression of what defines them their artistic voice, their sense of place, and the unseen threads that connect them to their work. Belonging is not just about a physical space; it is an emotional, spiritual, and creative homecoming. For me, belonging is intertwined with nature, an echo of childhood memories the rhythmic patter of footsteps down the long corridors of my Kolkata home, the warmth of the terrace beneath the relentless Indian summer. It is the mist-covered hills of Meghalaya, a place that forever tugs at my soul. My belonging is never static; it shifts and flows, always searching, never contained. It is a longing, a quiet whisper calling me back to the past a past that still lingers, shaping the artist I am today in Melbourne.
This exhibition is an ode to that search, to the moments that anchor us, and to the art that becomes our true home. The participating artists bring forth their own intimate narratives of belonging. Together, these artists weave a collective narrative one of identity, memory, and the eternal search for a place to call home. - Nandita Chakraborty
Participants
Nandita Chakraborty, Nitasha Malik, Rajvi Saria, Shipra Anand and Samaya Tiwary.
Nandita Chakraborty
Nandita Chakraborty, producer of the group show Belonging, is a mixed media artist whose practice explores the intersection of lived reality and the inner landscapes of the neuro-mind. Her work is driven by a desire to visualise how memory, emotion, and perception shape our understanding of self and place. Drawing from both personal and collective experiences, she creates layered compositions that blur the boundaries between the external world and internal cognition.
Using a filmic approach, Chakraborty integrates texture, movement, and visual rhythm to evoke the sensation of thought in motion. Her pieces often feel like fragments of a larger narrative intimate yet universal inviting viewers to engage not just with what is seen, but what is felt and remembered. Through her work, she examines belonging as both a physical and psychological state, revealing the complexity of identity in an ever-shifting world.
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It's my self-assessment of my beautiful brain, a mind that continues to see an abundance of childhood hidden within the space between reality and fantasy. Through a blend of live-action and animation, the work explores how imagination transforms the ordinary into something magical, fragile, and deeply human.
The idea emerged while I was travelling through regional Victoria directing Shared Table: Regional Heroes. It came to me most vividly during my journey to Nhill, where the landscape opened into endless skies, lakes, windmills, and silence. In that moment, my brain began creating its own world the bustling sound of a city train became an animated train carrying the little girl within me into womanhood, floating across the Nhill sky with the clouds and birds, above the lake towards the sun.
The work drifts between memory and imagination: rabbits from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland crawl beneath windmills, fantasy slips quietly into reality, and childhood wonder refuses to disappear. Then the endless speed of a car just like our brain running in 120 kms per minute.Beautifully Broken embraces neurodivergent imagination not as something fractured, but as a different way of seeing beauty, movement, and possibility in the world.
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A person with an animated brain on her face and the sound of a heartbeat on the image.Then a tree with an animated train. An animated girl floating in the sky. A feild with animated clouds and sun, then lots of windmills with animated rabbits and now it's continuous.speed of a car on the road.
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Filmed by Nandita Chakraborty
Animation by Priyankar Gupta
Edited by Samuel Thang Man
Nitasha Malik
Nitasha Malik is a Melbourne-based mixed media artist and founder of Lost Chitrakaar. Her journey into art began not as a career choice, but as a deeply personal response to life’s more challenging moments. What started as a form of emotional release gradually transformed into a full-time practice rooted in healing, reflection, and connection. Her work explores the intersection of vulnerability and strength, often expressed through layered textures, gold detailing, and symbolic forms. Drawing from Indian visual traditions while working within a contemporary framework, her pieces carry both cultural depth and personal narrative. Beyond the canvas, Nitasha extends her practice into community engagement through Saath Circle, creating spaces where art becomes a shared experience one that encourages connection, expression, and a sense of belonging. Her work stands as a reminder that art does not need to be perfected to be powerful. it simply needs to be felt.
Shipra Anand
Shipra Anand is a multidisciplinary artist whose work blends realism with personal interpretation to create artworks rich in emotion and meaning. Her creative journey is shaped by a foundation in traditional art coupled with computer graphics, user experience design, and software systems, alongside a deep passion for visual storytelling. Known for expressive portraiture and evocative landscapes, she explores human emotion through reinterpretation and custom commissions across diverse mediums. A returning exhibiting artist, Shipra draws on the power of Shakti, weaving mythology with contemporary expression. Her painting Shakti was the most Instagrammed work at the 2024 “Two Worlds Collide” exhibition.
Serenity and Storm - The Sacred Feminine Series
This portrait series draws inspiration from Durga and Kali to explore the many dimensions of feminine strength. Each work reflects the coexistence of calm and chaos, nurture and resistance, tenderness and fire that lives within every woman.
These goddesses are reimagined not as distant mythological figures, but as reflections of human emotion and lived experience. They hold the moon and become the fire; they nourish, protect, break silence, and rebuild what must transform. Through symbols of food, flame, motion, and protection, the series celebrates the quiet resilience and fierce courage that women carry every day.
Bold colours and layered symbolism bring together the gentle nurturer, the fearless protector, and the spiritual force of change. This collection is a tribute to the sacred balance of softness and strength—honouring women as guardians, creators, and catalysts of transformation across cultures and generations.
