Draupadi Santiago

Born in Pachuca de Soto, Hidalgo, in 1980, to a Nepalese mother and a Mexican father, Draupadi Santiago grew up between two cultural universes that shaped her sensitivity and aesthetic vision.
As a contemporary visual artist, her work unfolds as a territory of passage—spaces that are not only observed, but entered. Her pieces function as symbolic portals, thresholds where the inner and outer worlds meet, turning the viewer’s gaze into an active part of the experience.
She works primarily with watercolor and inks, layering transparencies and organic contrasts that generate depth and emotional vibration. Fluidity dialogues with more defined strokes, creating compositions that feel alive, in motion, and in constant transformation.
Each work offers an experience of pause and presence. It is not only about contemplating an image, but about entering it through mindful attention. Through meditation and conscious contemplation, her pieces invite self-inquiry: to observe what emerges, what moves within, what reveals itself in silence.
Her creations explore liminal states—moments in which something is ceasing to be what it was, yet has not fully become what it will be. In this in-between space, the work becomes both mirror and passage, facil...

She holds a Bachelor’s degree in International Business (ITESM-CEM, Mexico, 2001) and a Master’s degree in Operations and Supply Chain Management (University of Liverpool, England, 2012).
In 2014, she decided to begin a career as a visual artist. In her early years, she trained with watercolor artists at the studio of Lorena Kappes in Santiago, Chile (2014), and later with Lorena Fröhlich in Santiago, Chile (2018). She began her artistic path in an organic and largely self-taught manner, which she has complemented with courses and seminars in different parts of the world.
In 2025, she became certified as an Executive Ontological Coach by the Chilean School of Ontological Coaching, expanding her vision of consciousness and transformation. She also created the Umbral Method, a space designed to accompany individuals through experiences of awareness, where art, meditation, and the word become thresholds.

For the past five years, she has been based in Uruguay with her husband and son, where her artistic path continues to expand. She has exhibited at the International Art Fair MART (2026, 2025), where her work was awarded the Bank Heritage Prize; at the Embassy of Mexico in Montevideo (2025); the German Embassy (2021 and 2022); Art Night Uruguay (2021 and 2022); and at art fairs. She is an artist of Proyecto Arte (2024–2025), and a member of UyART!, Artes Uy, MIWA, and Gilda Micael (since 2025).