SATV, Kathmandu, Feb-02: Can tradition and technology exist in the same breath, or are they forever locked in opposition?

This question lingers as you move through the exhibition ‘Changing Times’ at The Kalā Salon, where mythology, spirituality, memory and artificial intelligence unfold across canvases in different visual languages.

Though each artist approaches a distinct theme, their works are united by a shared preoccupation with time. The past is not distant here, nor is the future abstract. Instead, both feel present.

Curator Sophia L Pandé says, “This exhibition is the culmination of over a year’s work; the results are thoughtful artworks.”

Roshan Pradhan’s ‘A Tale of Two Ages’ stages the tension between past and future dramatically. The canvas is split into two confronting worlds that meet at the centre like opposing forces in conversation. On one side stands a commanding, human-bodied figure crowned with a fierce Bhairav mask, draped in traditional ornaments and a tiger-skin garment.

Behind the figure, green hills roll into waterfalls and organic forms, suggesting a world still guided by nature and cosmic balance. The atmosphere feels alive, breathing, and spiritually charged.

Facing it is a humanoid robot with metallic limbs, with joints and gears visible. Though built in the image of a human, it appears uncertain, one hand raised as if in defense rather than attack. The land behind this figure is dry and fractured, filled with crumbling towers and a dust-heavy sky. Nature has thinned into ruin, replaced by rigid structures and lifeless ground.

The emotional tension lies in their posture. The Bhairav figure advances with grounded authority, while the robot recoils. It feels less like a battle between past and future and more like a philosophical encounter between the organic and the engineered, the spiritual and the artificial, permanence and fragility.