Bhargav Barla

Bhargav Barla (b. 1992)

Bhargav Barla is an artist based between Visakhapatnam and Delhi, working primarily in painting and photography. His practice revolves around visual storytelling through single-image compositions that explore themes of dreams, nostalgia, memory, and the quiet intensity of everyday life. Using light as a narrative and emotional tool, he constructs scenes that blur the boundaries between reality and imagination, often imbuing ordinary moments with a sense of the surreal. Figures in his works often appear within expansive landscapes or intimate interiors, creating a tension between the seen and the unseen, the self and the environment. He engages deeply with ideas of liminality—spaces and moments that exist between transitions—drawing on childhood memories of twilight and observation to inform his aesthetic. The psychological texture of these in-between states becomes central to his exploration of time, place, and perception.

Bhargav’s ongoing series Nature Harbour investigates small-town landscapes and their embedded oral histories. Through this, he reflects on disappearing environments and fading cultural memory, using distant and ambient light—like city glows or twilight hues—to evoke a quiet sense of loss. Influences on his work include the dramatic contrasts of Caravaggio and Rembrandt, the emotional atmospheres of Caspar David Friedrich, and the cinematic sensibilities of photographers such as Jeff Wall, Gregory Crewdson, and Todd Hido. His interest in magical realism shapes his approach to composition, where light often becomes symbolic rather than literal.

He holds a BFA in Painting from Andhra University (2014), an MFA in Painting from Visva-Bharati University, Santiniketan (2016), and a second Master’s in Performing Art and Design from Shiv Nadar University (2019). He is also currently engaged in research on photobooks, focusing on the narrative potential of the single image. Bhargav has exhibited nationally and internationally, with recent presentations India Art Fair (2023, 2024 and 2025) with Art Centrix Space;  including Art Mumbai (2024) and ‘Brink’, Art Centrix Space, New Delhi (2022); Building Bridges at the Old Tourist Burma Building, Yangon (2019); a solo at Kiran Nadar Museum of Art, Noida (2019); and Building Bridges at Gallery Sumukha, Bangalore (2018).