Photographer Martha Strawn will be in person at the Gregg Museum of Art & Design and scholar and author Vijaya Nagarajan will join Strawn remotely from San Francisco as they discuss their respective books about the ancient practice of rangoli or kōlam — ritual designs typically made of rice flour and drawn on thresholds and entrances. After the discussion, Strawn will lead a walk-through tour of her photography exhibition at the Gregg.

Strawn is a professor of art emerita at the University of North Carolina in Charlotte and author of Across the Threshold of India: Art, Women, and Culture. Nagarajan is an associate professor in the Department of Theology and Religious Studies and in the Environmental Studies Program at the University of San Francisco. Nagarajan is author of Feeding A Thousand Souls: Women, Ritual and Ecology in India, an Exploration of the Kōlam.