Rewa Walia is a contemporary artist whose work moves between abstract markings of inner states and devotional figuration. At the core of her practice are scratched, swirling surfaces that trace the journey from ache to divine radiance. Each painting begins as a raw field of emotion: layered colours, scored lines, and shifting textures that reveal how unstable, complex, and luminous the inner world can be. The surface is treated almost like skin and mind, remembering touch, imprint, and history.

Alongside this abstract work, Rewa follows a second inseparable path: figurative pieces inspired by the ecstatic love poetry of Vidyapati and the moods of Radha and Krishna. In these paintings, devotional figures are central, often accompanied by elements of abstract markings and restless colour, suggesting not only people but states of longing, separation, tenderness, and divine intimacy. Here, abstraction supports and intensifies the figuration rather than overtaking it.

These figurative works introduce an added layer of storytelling and function as personal expressions of identity.

Across both paths, Rewa is preoccupied with a single question: how to paint the movement of the soul. The work reflects the many forms the soul takes over many lifetimes lived in the material world, as well as the presence of the divine soul, whose movements of love and ecstasy appear here to ignite devotion and pure love within us. Scratches, swirls, and layered colour fields chart the passage from ache to radiance, from fragmented feelings to glimpses of transcendence. Whether a figure stands clearly in the foreground or is held within a subtly abstracted atmosphere, Rewa seeks that threshold where inner turbulence settles into quiet luminosity, inviting viewers to recognise something of their own journey in the marks.