'Vadehra Art Gallery presents a solo exhibition of paintings by Kerala - based contemporary painter, performing artist and theatre practitioner Smitha M. Babu titled A Choreography in Deep Green. The exhibition features upto 35 recent works rendered in watercolour on irregularly shaped bases. Her practice draws on her upbringing in Kerala’s backwaters, particularly in the Kollam district near Ashtamudi Lake, where traditional livelihoods and ecological balance have been increasingly a ltered by modernization and mechanization. Working primarily in watercolour, she uses atmospheric washes, soft tones and layered storytelling to create dream-like, meditative scenes exploring ideas of community, womanhood and a deep connection between people and landscape as evocative reflections on cultural change and loss.
Within these fluid and fantastical environments, she tends to center groups of sari-clad women holding hands and dancing, inspired by a local women’s theatre group that she has been part of for over two decades. Through movement, rhythm and repetition, she approaches the performative and mythic traditions that both emerge from and shape our collective identity, and further highlights the ritualistic and rehearsed elements of our shared histories . Across her work, memory, performance and landscape come together to express a sense of continuity, resilience and connection in a changing world. Smitha has most recently participated in the sixth edition of the Kochi – Muziris Biennale titled for the time being, curated by Nikhil Chopra and HH Art Spaces.
About the Artist
Born in 1981 in the Kollam district, Kerala, Smitha M. Babu received a fine arts degree in painting from the College of Fine Arts in Thiruvananthapuram. As a painter and theatre practitioner, Babu’s practice draws on the ecological geography and lived histories of her homeland through theatrically constructed compositions that collapse time into layered, non - linear narratives and foreground connections between landscape and community, especially among women.
Babu has had solo presentations at several institutional venues, including Paakkalam at Durbar Hall Art Gallery, Kochi (2024) and Kerala Lalithakala Akademi (2024), as well as Sketches in Motion: A Symphony of Lines at Kollam Public Library, Kerala (2003). She recently participated in the sixth edition of the Kochi – Muziris Biennale curated by Nikhil Chopra with HH Art Spaces (2025 - 26). Her other group exhibitions include Gallery Dtale Archist, Bangalore (2025); Kochi Biennale Pavilion, Hortus at Kozhikode B each, Kerala (2024); and National Lalit Kala Akademi (2023), among others. As a thespian, she has performed in renditions of Eugène Ionesco’s The Chairs and Girish Karnad’s Naga Mandala. She played the lead in Ekantham (2021), a Malayalam adaptation of Anton Chekhov’s The Bet, and acted in Theendari Pachcha (2022). She also directed the play Kalamkuriyude Kadha, written by Sreeja Arangottukara. The artist lives and works in Ernakulam, Kerala.
‘A Choreography in Deep Green’ by Smitha M. Babu on-view at Vadehra Art Gallery until 15th May, 2026.
Text Courtesy Vadehra Art Gallery
Date 7.5.2026