Grace and Grit

In 2023, Nirmal Raja – a Milwaukee-based artist now living in Cambridge, MA – participated in the Kohler Arts/Industry residency program in Kohler, WI. The residency provides artists a place to make their artwork in tandem with the skilled craftspeople who work for Kohler Co., a global leader in the manufacture of kitchen and bath products, engines and power generation systems, cabinetry, tile and home interiors. For three months, Raja worked closely with factory workers in the foundry to create an expansive, eclectic, and diverse body of work. She writes:

My focus was on using the properties of metal to explore notions of weight, strength, and resilience as I see them existing around me – in women, in human labor, and in the ingenuity of nature. The works in the front gallery are in honor of the women in my family but also the strength of so many women around me. They balance grace and grit in resilient and precarious ways amidst the texture of everyday challenges.

I worked closely with Nirmal to produce this catalog, which accompanied her exhibition of this work at Portrait Society Gallery.