Komal Madar

Komal Madar (b.1983) works across painting, sculpture, performance and installation. Her multidisciplinary practice examines materials and their materiality through an anthropological lens, drawing on ritual, memory, and embodied labour. Her practice is grounded in the philosophy of kismet (fate), and chance as both method and material, shaped by ancestral Indian cosmologies, Hindu philosophical thought, and the rhythms and rituals of her lived cultural experience.

Komal’s work often begins with the hunt for materials, and this search started close to home. Raised within an Indian community in the UK, she grew up surrounded by its aesthetic and material cultures, particularly textiles. For over twenty years, she has collected fabric offcuts from local Indian tailors. Through repetition, accumulation and rigorous methodical actions, she constructs forms that resemble the body. Her engagement with the tactile and transformative properties of textiles allows them to embody both individual histories and larger socio-political discourses that speak to the joys and pains of being human.

In 2024, Komal spent time in Jaipur studying Indian miniature painting under master painters Ajay Sharma and Vinita Sharma. During this time, she developed a deeper connection to ancestral artistic practices and a growing interest in material transformation as both process and philosophy. Through layered imagery, she explores narratives shaped by memory, Indian mythology, symbolism, and surrealist realms.

Komal lives and works in London, recently graduating with an MA in Fine Art from Liverpool John Moores University (2025), building on her earlier training at Central Saint Martins and the University of Reading.

Recent projects include Sari Forest, an immersive installation and augmented reality collaboration with computer programmer Julian Todd (2025), and curated Traces, a group show for the Liverpool Independents Biennial. Exhibitions include NAEOpen 2026 group show (May 2026), Talisman at Bridewell Studios &Gallery (2025), and Miniature Postage Stamp Masterpiece at Nippon Gallery (touring India, 2024–2025). Press coverage includes a feature in Vogue India, highlighting her bold and provocative Yoni textile sculptures within a contemporary art landscape.

‍