Neha Shah is a 28 year old, artist, mother and papercraft ninja! Her skills in the art of quilling and papercrafting are absolutely amazing and she is one of the most popular artists on BananaBandy.
Right since I can remember, art was chasing me.
There is an enormous spring of creative life inside of her. A trained Oddisi dancer, an engineer and a self made artist. As a fresher she joined IBM and became team leader within a year. She experiments with photography in her free time. And at the age of 27 she came across quilling and fell in love with it.
Quilling is the process of construction with paper strips and glue. She stumbled across this artform while searching for DIY projects online and it immediately captured her imagination. She fell in love with the art and sought the help of various blogs and videos online to learn multiple skills and techniques. She’s documented her journey so far in a very structured manner in her blog.
In terms of the style and process behind her art, she leans towards more handmade styles, especially those which involve paper as a material. Quilling is a very spontaneous act for her.
I draw a sketch for the reference or take a printout of a design, then decide which colors am I going to use. After this everything is spontaneous. One design consists of many many elements. The most challenging aspect is the time consuming nature of the working process. There is no shortcut here. There is no CTRL+Z in quilling once a quilled element is pasted.
She loves the fact that playing with paper is so much fun for her. She believes that there is no right or wrong way in quilling and one should proceed as one feels like. Photography is an integral part of her work as well. She needs to capture what she has made in an aesthetic manner which pleases the viewer.
She has always been keen to experiment with her artwork. Paper has brought out the sculptor in her. It has the most magnificent ability to turn into anything with the right technique. She is currently integrating paper quilling with paper cut art. Embossing and stamping are also some other styles which she is keen to master and inculcate in her artwork.
Experiments fuel creativity and change. Experimenting means you are intentionally going off the map and pushing beyond the status quo: you are doing something for which the outcome is uncertain, and doing it on purpose. It’s that uncertainty that creates the potential for big positive change.
Though she is a self taught artist, she believes that it is a good idea to consider formal art education. She belives that anybody with a desire for education must be respected. However, for those who have discovered their artistic side later in life or decided that it’s not practical to get an art degree, she says:
There is absolutely no reason to assume that because you have no degree, you won’t be able to do much with your artwork. Gallery owners are pragmatic. They want to sell art. Art collectors are not going to buy bad artwork just because someone with a prestigious degree produced it. An art degree is not going to make silk purse out of a sow’s ear.
Remember this one thing if nothing else: it’s all about the quality of your art, not about your educational background. Self-taught, art school, whatever. It is all insignificant compared to what you actually can do.
Quick Questions:
Name your favourite movie from all time?
The Terminal and DDLJ 🙂
Favourite Hexadecimal Colour Code?
Favourite Font?
Cambria
What’s the most annoying cliché in art that you’ve observed?
The first question looking at my quilling: “What are these made of?” I tell them it’s paper.
The very next question: “Are all these paper?” I am like :/ Yessss!
Which is the coolest project that you’ve seen on BananaBandy?
If you were not an artist then what would you be?
If not quiller I would be an acclaimed Dancer.
