Myths to Mundane exhibit at ARTS at King Street Station. Photo by Marcus Donner. We spoke with ARTS at King Street Station Artist in Residence Shruti Ghatak about her practice, residency experience, and her current gallery show Myths to Mundane. Read on to learn more.
Shruti Ghatak is an Indian-born Seattle-based artist. Her work explores the intricate relationship between the human condition and the landscapes she inhabits, both physical and emotional. At the core of her practice is an exploration of the human condition, drawing from India’s vast narrative history—ranging from mythological texts to regional folklore and contemporary cultural shifts. She fuses these stories with the current social landscape, addressing issues such as migration, displacement, and cultural hybridization.
What is your background in the arts? How did you get to where you are now in your practice?
Like every child I started drawing at a very young age. The only difference is that I never stopped since then. At the age of four, my mother enrolled me in a local art class, setting the foundation for a lifelong creative journey. While I pursued academic studies in chemistry, I continued my art practice in parallel—taking night classes, learning alongside practicing artists in their studios, watching incredible artisans working in their craft of clay, wood, or metal around where I grew up.
Art and science have always gone hand in hand in my life. During my Master’s research, I found the perfect bridge between these two worlds, focusing on the intersection of art and science through a study of dyes, pigments, and color technology. That experience deepened my fascination with materiality and eventually led me to fully immerse myself in the world of art, completing a second master’s degree in Painting from New York Studio School of Drawing Painting and Sculpture.
I’ve never believed in the left brain/right brain divide—creative and analytical thinking are not opposites. I see creativity as deeply rooted in curiosity, problem-solving, and observation—qualities essential to both artists and scientists.
What’s your favorite part about Seattle arts? Is there anything that excites you about the arts community here?
What I love most about Seattle’s art scene is its openness to diverse voices and experimental practices. I’m especially drawn to how the city encourages dialogue around identity, place, and social justice through art—it feels like a space where personal and collective stories can truly be heard and felt.
What inspires your work? Tell us more about the process behind Myths to Mundane.
My work often begins as a response to stories—drawn from epics, literature, poetry, music, and even conversations. These initial sparks take shape as small sketches in my notebook, capturing the emotional tone or visual fragments that stay with me. Myths to Mundane grew from these responses, evolving through a layered, intuitive process.
As I develop a painting, I create additional supportive drawings, sculpt reliefs, and sometimes even perform as the characters myself—dressing up and posing in front of a mirror to better understand their posture, expression, or presence. It becomes a kind of constructed world, a blend of observation and invention, where the real and imagined coexist. Through this process, the boundaries between myth and daily life begin to blur, and what starts as personal reflection slowly transforms into a broader visual narrative.
This show explored how myths can be seen as mundane moments. It is also true the other way around-like how mundane moments sometimes can be mythic. I’ve been fascinated by how something as simple and playful as dressing up in a Halloween costume can unexpectedly trigger a deeper imaginative space—where the mundane slips into the mythic. A child putting on a mask or a cape becomes more than just pretend; they momentarily embody a character, a creature, or a force beyond themselves. That transformation, fleeting but powerful, mirrors the way I think about myth: as something not distant or ancient, but very much alive, accessible, and often sparked by everyday gestures. I am trying to explore that in-between-ness through my work.
What are you working on in the residency space at ARTS at King Street Station?
In the residency space, I am working on terracotta relief sculptures. I grew up in the Eastern part of India surrounded by terracotta temples. With no access to galleries, museums, or art books in my childhood, these temple reliefs were my first exposure to art. Bishnupur, with its dense concentration of terracotta temples, has been especially influential.
Clay and terracotta are a big part of my practice, symbolizing memory, history, and transformation. Rooted in Indian traditions of storytelling through temple and ritual sculpture, terracotta connects me to a lineage while allowing me to explore contemporary themes of identity, migration, and belonging.
Paint and clay serve distinct roles in my work—pigment allows fluid narratives, while terracotta offers a visceral, tactile presence that embodies the tension between permanence and impermanence.
What impact has this residency had on your practice?
The ARTS at King Street Station residency had a significant impact on my practice by making it possible to balance multiple roles—artist, parent, educator—without having to step away from them. Traditional residencies often require travel and long periods away, which can be challenging when navigating family life and parenting. Being able to stay rooted with all my responsibilities while still engaging deeply in a focused studio environment allowed me to grow my work meaningfully. It offered the space and support I needed to prioritize my practice without compromising my other responsibilities, which has been both grounding and empowering. With the grant, I was able to cut down some of my workload and save some focused studio time. I managed to make a significant body of work during the residency. All these works are going to be added to the show as a celebration of the residency. I’m really looking forward to that part.
What do you hope viewers take away from seeing Myths to Mundane?
I hope Myths to Mundane can encourage a dialogue—between past and present, between different cultures, and between personal and collective narratives. If the exhibition sparks curiosity, introspection, or even a re-examination of one’s own relationship with history and identity, then it has fulfilled its purpose.
About Myths to Mundane
Through a compelling series of figurative landscape paintings and terracotta relief sculptures, the exhibition Myths to Mundane reimagines India’s rich cultural history, from mythological texts like the Ramayana and Mahabharata and regional folklore to personal narratives and contemporary realities. Myths to Mundane is on view at ARTS at King Street Station until May 3, 2025. Shruti will be in residence through the course of her exhibition.
ARTS at King Street Station is open Wed. – Sat. 11 a.m. – 5 p.m. and until 8 p.m. on First Thursdays. Admission is free. The gallery is located at 303 S. Jackson St., Top Floor, Seattle, WA 98104.
