I, Priti Kakkar,
am a mosaic artist.

My journey with mosaics traces back to a childhood encounter with Roman ruins on the Mediterranean shoreline.  It was rekindled, years later, while I was in the artistic city of Moscow, this time as a wife and mother.  What began as a fascination has become a life-long practice - with wide-ranging training, and a sense of serendipity guiding me, this radiant medium revealed itself as the place where my artistic voice naturally belonged. 

 

My practice as a mosaic artist is rooted in the belief that meaning can be built from fragments. Working with hand-cut tesserae of glass, stone, marble, and ceramic, I assemble countless individual pieces into a visual language that is both contemporary and deeply connected to an ancient art. My forms emerge through deliberate lines and directional flows of tesserae, allowing movement and rhythm to develop gradually across the surface.

 

Central to my process is the way tesserae interact with light. Because each piece, having its own unique texture, is set at its own angle, a mosaic never appears fixed; it shifts with changing light, revealing new depths, tones, and accents throughout the day. Some surfaces absorb light, others reflect or refract it, creating a dynamic rhythm of brilliance that no flat medium can achieve. By selecting materials with distinct luminosity, and cutting them in ways that shape their interaction with light, I allow emotion to be expressed through shimmer, glow, and a quiet diffusion.

 

The subjects I explore are drawn from both the energy forces of the outer world and the inner emotional landscapes of human experience.  The generative forces of the cosmos, instincts for flight and survival and nature’s determination to resurrect itself, are the energies of outer worlds that I portray in different mosaic series. Equally, the portrayal of energies of Indian spiritual beliefs and those of global ancient spiritual philosophies give depth to my mosaics.  The depiction of various energy flows creates my visual mosaic language that is experienced more through feeling rather than words. 

 

To visually express the rising energy and emotional currents in my mosaics, I employ the classical Roman mosaic principles of order, rhythm, and an overall compositional flow.  To achieve this, my mosaic style embodies smooth repeated curving flows and patterns, creating a visual pulse, much like a rhythmic breathing pattern.  Because the colours, shapes, and lines flow in a steady, rhythmic way, the viewer’s eye moves naturally across the mosaic without effort or confusion. This gentle movement creates a feeling of harmony and balance that can be sensed by anyone, regardless of culture or background. Light reflects differently across the surface as the eye travels, giving the work a quiet radiance. Together, this sense of flow, balance, and light communicates meaning through feeling rather than symbols—allowing the mosaic to speak a universal visual language that suggests life, continuity, and inner movement even within the apparent stillness of the mosaic.

 

From this living foundation of material, memory, and inner inquiry, my practice continues to unfold and evolve.  Each mosaic marks a moment in an ongoing journey—of curiosity, training, experimentation, and a quiet devotion to an ancient medium. As a mosaicist, I find myself between ruins and radiance - channelling universal energies and ancient wisdom by expressing emotions through light, cut, placement and repetition of fragments. 

 

To learn more about my journey and the way philosophies and processes have shaped my art, please click on the links below: