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Far from the East Coast heart of the art world, on a West Coast campus known more for science and engineering than for fine arts, Avantika Bawa creates complex art installations that draw critical acclaim and bring grants, residencies and invitations to exhibit.

“My understanding of the art world and my approach to my own work have grown much richer since joining �鶹��ý,” she said. “My work has become more honest.”

Bawa, associate professor of fine arts, creates work that is both abstract and down to earth. For example, she has been working since 2012 on a series of site-specific installations called “The Scaffold Series.” These artworks are literal scaffolds, placed in otherwise-empty spaces— some vast, some intimate. In January 2021, The Oregonian mentioned a few of them in a review of her work in a roundup of local galleries, including AGENDA, where Bawa had a show called “Constructing Darkness”: “Avantika Bawa’s site-specific scaffold installations have presence. She’s installed a sizzling pink version in the Rann, a salt desert in India, and a gold metallic version in the grand, dilapidated lobby of the Astor Hotel in Astoria [Oregon]. The orange and white versions of the series were installed in industrial- sized gallery spaces. She hones the scaffolds to the size of playthings in response to this new jewel-box-sized gallery in southeast Portland. Printed on a 3D printer and painted metallic silver, the structures continue Bawa’s practice of creating minimalist line drawings in space.”

But a viewer might also have a visceral reaction, seeing these structures as beautiful and strange, simple and evocative, as people walk about the spaces, under the scaffolding, casting shadows on the walls, floors and ceilings. The scaffolds are to be experienced, not just looked at. Bawa also exhibits her drawings and prints internationally. Her drawings are often preliminary studies or inspired by her installations, while the majority are stand-alone pieces. “These drawings are deliberate yet impulsive, as I work with the pure physicality of line, shape, surface and color,” she wrote in an artist’s statement.

She currently holds a printmaking residency at Watershed Center at the Pacific Northwest College of Art in Portland, Ore. There, she and the students make large prints that combine relief printing techniques with silkscreen. These, too, often reflect the themes in her site- specific installations.

Immersed in campus life

Bawa works in a studio on the �鶹��ý campus that used to be a storage room in the Public Safety building. She chose this space deliberately. She could have had a studio in the Classroom Building, where most art classes are taught. But, she said, “I like that it‘s away from the classroom and away from home.”

Plus it comes with lots of conveniences. “I share a wall with the mailroom,” she said. “That is great. Going to the Post Office and FedExn to ship work and wait in line is the bane of my existence, but I can instead walk next door.”

Her neighbors in the building are another bonus: “I love those conversations with the cops on campus, and I need them for my practice,” she said. “I have physical stuff to move around, things to spray paint, so I’m constantly asking questions of Bill Hooper [associate vice chancellor for facilities services]. He and his staff are extremely important to my research. I ask where to stack my scaffolds, can I get someone to help me spray paint something. Bill and his team are instrumental.”

Bawa’s art benefits from other resources at �鶹��ý as well. For example, in applying for a Guggenheim fellowship, she got help crafting her statement from Kandy Robertson, coordinator of the Writing Center.

The remoteness of the studio allows her to evangelize for the campus. “A lot of people see �鶹��ý for the first time because I’ve invited them to my studio,” Bawa said. “I make them park in the Orange Lot [so they have to meander across the campus] to walk to the studio. It’s a way of bragging about the campus.”

Since 2010, Bawa has been part of the small arts department—which also includes Harrison Higgs, the program leader, and technician Noah Matteucci. Students can minor in fine arts, but there is no major. Bawa teaches core classes, including studio courses in drawing and painting. “Our focus is to be the best minor we can,” she said.

On the move

Bawa spends part of each year in her home country of India. A native of New Delhi, she frequently exhibits there, and her work is deeply influenced by the culture and chaos of India.

“The work is deceptively simple, so it’s a response to that chaos,” she said. “It’s a layered and analytical process, but the end result looks simple. There is organized chaos in making it, and maybe that comes from the ability to navigate the madness of the city.” And yet, “India is such a complex country with so many layers of being. You can’t just say this is the work that’s Indian,” she added.

She is constantly working, constantly on the move. Over the winter break, she spent time in Chandigarh, India, researching buildings that are brutalist in architectural style (brutalist structures comprise one of her artistic themes). She documented the structures in hopes of creating a series of works to be shown in India. In January, Bawa opened a solo show, “simplenothingsimplesomething,” at Illinois State University, with both a site-specific installation and a showing of the prints she has been making at PNCA.

Bawa earned her bachelor’s degree at Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda, India, and her M.F.A. in painting at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She taught at the Savannah College of Art and Design in Georgia before moving to Portland. Bawa has been on the board of the Oregon Arts Commission since 2014 and is also on the board of the Yucca Valley Material Lab in Yucca Valley, Calif., which was started by a friend to provide opportunities to anyone who wants to make art.

In 2004, Bawa co-founded an online critical journal called Drain, which includes features, reviews and interviews, organized around cultural themes, with artists from all over the world. Drain exists “to promote lively and well-informed debate around theory and praxis,” according to its website. Serving as one of Drain’s editors and board members also gives her a place at the table of the international art world.

“I love it, for the same reason that I like working at WSU,” she said. “My artistic practice is very focused in ideas of site and space and minimalist traditions. Through Drain I enjoy being able to talk about theories and processes that aren’t part of my direct studio practice.”