Pablo Picasso once said, “Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up.” Now, the only ones who didn’t let go are the ones we know as artists and witness working in the art industry. However, among those faces lie some fresh ones. The faces are young enough to make one wonder, “What if I had not let it go?”
The way people see, view, and interpret art is changing. From the traditional galleries filled with paintings and statues to the streets where art can now be interacted with. Art is potentially becoming more and more accessible for a wider audience. An example of this could be found on a website such as https://infoart.hfg-karlsruhe.de/open-doors-ein-interaktives-kunstprojekt-im-stadtraum-karlsruhe/ along with others, that showcase how artists have possibly adapted and changed their art to better illustrate their environment. Now here are five young artists who are possibly creating their own new narrative.
Soma Surovi Jannat 
Interaction, collaboration or social engagements are the main aspects of Soma’s working process. Her body of works includes drawing, painting, installation, and site-specific artworks. As an artist, she sees herself as a bridge to connect different aspects in surrounding and reform them with an optimistic approach. Her experience and understanding of nature, the raw essence of different communities, their affinity and simplicity towards nature, the way of living all combine to form a visual harmony that takes up the physical form of her artwork. Every act of people is not apart from the current social or political structure. It is all connected. So is Soma’s art. In her work, it comes in a very indirect way. In her last project in Bangladesh “Cultivation of senses”, her experiences of nature incorporate onto the surface as a medium of expression. Elements from her imagination directed her to draw the pictures down to up. But, the direction or vertical growth symbolizes the contemporary socio-political scenarios rather than a horizontal social chain. Stairs recalled the urban life and vertical growth of chains and servitude. 
In this work, she wants to signify social ignorance, lack of attention, urbanization, industrialization, insufficient agricultural land, but through her paddy plant what is attached to her artwork is a little upside- rooftop farm, through which she wants to spread ‘hope’. All her artworks are ‘process’ works. A process cannot be sold. But to her, for the final product, the price depends on the place and the situation of financial surviving. She never lets a challenge stress her out. Since sometimes it could be difficult to bring an artist’s work to new audiences. Yet, it’s always exciting for her to travel, work in different spaces and share her work with different people. And she always tries to keep herself open for any kind of criticism. The way she creates art depends on the mental state and the state of the surroundings prevailing at the time when she is immersed in thinking about an artwork. This process creates its own values and makes its own demands. She senses and works within those specific values and demands.
Sharker Nasrin
Visual art, performance art, installation art, sculpture – Sharker Nasrin navigates through all. For sculpture and installation, she works in an organic mode. She creates art influenced by the natural environment and particularly enjoys working with clay. On the other hand, in her performance art, social issues do come forth. Feminism reflects on her performances very naturally as well. One of her favorite works was one that she did in front of the parliament building. It was an Asian Biennale workshop production. It was about a prostitute. She feels that people go to women when they need something. Even a baby cries for her mother when it needs to be breastfed. In that sense, Nasrin tried to portray that society makes women feel like prostitutes. She did a movement on it through her art. It was very challenging because law enforcement tried to stop it. However, she managed to pull it off. Sharker never looks at art as a separate form.
She believes she lives her art which is her life, every single moment of it. Every little thing she does is a part of it. That’s how she can tie anything that exists to her art. She feels like performance art can never go wrong. For instance, Sharker considers her performance art as public art. It is very uncertain. An artist can only start intentionally. But he or she won’t know where it is going to end. However, in visual art, Sharker sometimes gets frustrated while failing to execute the art as per her plan. It could happen for lack of support or equipment. Even while making sculptures, difficulties may arise in technicalities which lead to stress. But then she just starts over. That’s better than leaving it. Since she has spent some time in Japan, she has practiced Butoh. Even though she follows her contextual way in her performance, but her body movement and gestures are Butoh techniques.
Madhubanti Raya
A student of Dhaka University’s Charukola, Drawing, and Painting, Madhubanti Raya prefers to do conceptual art. She does painting, pen, and sketch. Tying life experiences with/to the work is very important, she feels. Raya works with what she thinks and the situation she is in.
Her philosophies come up through her art. She claims her works to be very simple, yet she tries to make them meaningful. Her works mostly portray women empowerment since that is what works as a driver for Raya. Her cartoons even commented on social or political issues. Those were mostly based on corruption.
However, Raya certainly paints for herself. Yet, it is true that art is for people as well. So, it is important to present it to people. But nowadays, making your art reach people have taken up a form of showing off. This now matters more than the art itself making it difficult for an artist to navigate the art world. But that’s how it is in the commercial world. That’s why she prefers to do paintings for herself and graphic designing for commercial purposes. Even though she is making a career out of painting, still she makes sure she does it for herself. There are times when the whole experience becomes frustrating. However, Raya overcomes it by working even harder.
Sajia Rahman Shondha
Having completed her studies in Fine Arts from UODA, she is working freelance as a visual artist. She has participated in several exhibitions in the nation. She mainly does text-based art. Words, letters, alphabets – these are what she specializes in. The signature touch of Sajia that is seen among all her artworks is her handwriting. She loves to write. And that’s what she bases her artwork on. She also expresses a desire to go for performance art soon.
Life is filled with experiences and events, both that brings a smile on your face or a tear in your eye or maybe both, if lucky. These reflect on people’s works. And Sajia hopes to portray those properly through her artworks.
When she sits to draw or paint, she doesn’t do any layout, be that for an exhibition or for herself. She just starts going at it on a white paper. The art comes naturally and instantly. Whenever people see an artwork, they can get mesmerized by it even if they don’t understand it. Because then they try to find meaning in it. Sajia considers her works to be like that. She wants the audience to try to understand the emotions that she throws in her artworks.
To her, success is people standing in front of her artworks in exhibitions and spending some time trying to understand it. Her works do portray feminism as well. Women empowerment is yet to be fully achieved according to this artist. She feels many women are still not fully independent be that mentally, socially or financially. Therefore, many of her works try to speak about women empowerment. She sets a higher price for the big paintings or the ones which have more emotional value to her. Comparatively, the small ones which need less work have a lesser price. Yet, the ones that she loves the most or has sentimental value attached cannot be bought at any cost. Sajia feels there should be more workspace facilities for young artists, their ideas should be given more importance, new media art should be prioritized too in academics instead of focusing on visual art only and community-based development should take place for artists rather than individual progress.
Yaksana Roksar
Currently, doing her Honor’s on printmaking, Yaksana is a painter, performance artist, printmaker, and fashion designer because experimenting with different media never fail to amuse her. In her childhood days, there was a rickshaw workshop near her house. While going to school every day, she used to witness the craftsmen making rickshaw paintings. From there, her interest in art grew.
For her art, she basically likes to work with her personal thoughts and people’s psychology as well as nature. Her works consist of relief process, aquatint, drypoint, monoprint, etc. However, abstract artwork is her personal preference of medium. Her concepts depend on time, place, situation and what she feels at that very moment. Her works do relate to her life experiences since she is an artist. She loves to travel. She is always up for placing herself in various situations, indulging herself in different works. She does not stick to one particular pattern. For instance, when she is in pain, she embraces the experience that inspires her in her work. Her works aim to connect people with art.
Wondering about art, embracing it, trying to understand – the whole process is amazing, she believes. She does not refrain to comment on social or political issues through her work. Recently, she did a performance art at Jatra Biroti on the menstrual cycle. She showed the process through her performance. The point was to make people understand that this is not a taboo. Unlike some others, Yaksana never feels frustrated while working. Maybe because she turned to art looking for an escape from the depression she was suffering back in 2015. Since then art has been a medium of communication with the world, allowing people to have a peek at the thoughts playing in her mind.
