Another milestone achieved. Receiving the Padma Shree from the former President of India, Mrs. Patibha Devi Singh Patil, Hemi looks radiant as her complete commitment to art is validated and her gruelling hard work over the years endorsed publicly.
Hemi’s fifteen-foot-high bronze sculpture titled Girl Child was India’s entry at the prestigious Sculpture 2000, held in New London, Connecticut, in the United States of America – and was showcased at the waterfront. Later the art work was bought by a private dealer.
The Park Hotel in Chennai speaks the language of the new global India. Complementing this dynamism, Hemi’s creation — a contemporary flower — adds to the cosmopolitan nature of the hotel. The art work, made of aluminium with cast glass centres, symbolises welcome.
Hemi forayed into a space which had not found a footing in the geography of the Indian art world: the studio glass practice. In this, one of earliest works, she uses pure cast glass with copper cut-out figures in a creation that is more abstract in the sculptural language.
Hemi is constantly crossing boundaries in her artistic practice. Innovation and experimentation are an integral part of her artistic journey. The year 2009 sees Hemi experimenting with copper and glass, fusing the two together to bring another innovative dialect into her painterly language.
Hemi Bawa & Manmohan Singh Former Prime Minister of India
Hemi’s aluminum sculpture, Fire, lights up a private garden in Tuscany, one of her many installations that have found a place of honour across the world. Fire is part of a project that resulted in many sculptures by artists from different countries.
The Coca Cola Company commissioned Hemi to do a special work of art for the 1996 Atlanta Olympics. Hemi created an eight-foot sculpture of a Coke bottle in glass. Inside the bottle were seated colourful snake charmers while the external facade of the bottle had hand painted textile motifs from different states of India.
