Threads and Tradition

YOU COULD NOT be blamed for missing it. When the cab does pull into a nondescript turn, it seems one has arrived at a Bisleri factory in South Mumbai. But with­in the embrace of this warehouse-like space nestles Space118 Art Foundation. Founded by Saloni Doshi, it has been nurturing the artistic community by pro­viding space for studios, residencies and exhibitions since 2009. Currently Space 118 has been transformed into a tapestry with an exhibition dedicated to textile and fibre-based art. Displayed over five studios, The Woven Path: textile and fibre-based art from the Saloni Doshi Collection integrates heritage textiles with contemporary textile, and thus challenges the viewer’s percep­tion of the ancient and the modern. The five studios named, ‘The Source,’ ‘Crystallisation’, ‘Alchemy’, ‘Transformation’ and ‘Realisation’ chart the journey of consciousness, from seed to awakening. Couplets from Kabir written on the floor and walls, add a layer of meaning and significance. As a poet, weaver and philosopher, Kabir’s dohas sync well with the show.

Curated along the storyline of ‘creation’ and ‘culmination’ by Chennai-based gallerist Sharan Apparao the show spans a trajectory from Raja Ravi Varma’s embroidered oleographs to Abraham & Thakore’s double ikat hand weave on silk. Along the way one will also see moti kaam (beadwork) on a toran from Saurashtra, hand-dyed works by Deena Pindoria and the Das Mahavidya hand embroidered by the Charu Centre Chamba. Curator of the show, Apparao explains that she chose works for the five sections to reflect a journey from beginning to end. So, we start with the ‘seed’ as seen in Parul Thacker’s Arctic Series, hand embroidered with silk and cotton threads. We end with an ode to the divine with Raja Ravi Varma’s oleographs and a display of cholis (blouses) from Kutch. Apparao explains the contrast, “One was used to adorn the gods, and one was used to adorn ourselves.”

The works cover a wide range of techniques, mediums and messages. While some are reverential and religious in nature, others are more defiant, even subversive. Drawn from Doshi’s personal collection, the textile works on display highlight her broad and nuanced vision for the arts. Doshi’s interest and pas­sion for textiles seems preordained as she grew up seeing silk and khadi from close quarters. As her grandfather was a free­dom fighter, he was partial to khadi, and as silk mill owners, the house would often be full of taffeta silk bundles. As the child of a Maharashtrian father and a Bengali mother, she was exposed from a young age to fabrics and weaves from different parts of India. She recalls how her mother would wear Tangail, Dhakai and Chanderi sarees during the day, and the heavier Banarasi or South silk sarees in the evenings. Trained in classical Indian music by Shubha Mudgal, and in Bharatnatyam, Doshi believes that she has long had the vocab­ulary to understand and appreciate the art and culture of India.

For me the message I want to communicate is more important than the medium. Many artists have used these weaves to communicate the stories of their region. That was what was interesting, says Saloni Doshi, founder of Space118

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When Doshi would travel across the country, her mother would ask her to pick up sarees with specific details. At times she wanted bootis, at other times peacock motifs. When she would visit her maternal grandmother in Kolkata, she would meet the Dhakai saree vendors who would come home. As a tribute to her mother’s love for handloom and handwoven sarees, some of her own and her mother’s sarees are also on display at Space 118’s office during the show. These include a striking red Kanjivaram saree from Tamil Nadu, a double ikkat Patola from Gujarat, and a Paithani saree from Maharashtra, to name just a handful.

Always a collector, Doshi started with stamps and coins as a child, and moved onto art as an adult. She says, “I have not bought art thinking specifically that it is textile-based art. I have just bought art and it happens to be textile based. For me the message I want to communicate is more important than the me­dium. Many artists have used these weaves to communicate the stories of their region. That was what was interesting for me.”

Apparao has similarly always had an interest in Indian textiles and handloom, both personally and professionally. She says, “I always had this connection with textiles, and every time I saw contemporary artists using textiles, it really lit my heart up.” As an art dealer, curator, and founder of Apparao Galleries, Chennai, she recently mounted an exhibition around the “idea of Gandhi and the role of textiles in the history of India’s independence.” Given their twin passions, it is little surprise that Doshi and Apparao successfully mounted The Woven Path from seed to realisation in a little over two months.

SOME OF THE most striking works at the show are those which use specific weaves and techniques to tell powerful stories. Take for example, Jayeeta Chatterjee’s The Story Is True. This black-and-white scene of fisherwomen might look like a sketch from afar, but on closer inspection it reveals itself to be a Pochampally (a weaving technique from Hyderabad) on a white cotton background. Through her practice, Chatterjee reveals the lives of women from lower-income groups, and this work is a poignant example of the same. While the woman in the centre is chopping fish, the other two seem to be in deep conversation with her. It is a textile work which imbues a mundane activity with richness. A hand painting (made with cotton, paper, watercolour and glass beads) which is also deeply evocative is Speak, your life is still your own by Varunika Saraf. The artist and art historian based in Hyderabad uses a multitude of archival sources (art history, newspapers, popular culture, etc.) to engage with the present. In this particular large-scale painting, we see a host of historical characters sitting in boats on a deep blue sea, while a multitude of faces stare out from a yellow background above. We see Akbar atop an elephant. Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru confer in one boat. BR Ambedkar stands alone in another boat. Manto seems to be talking to no one in particular in a different vessel. Doshi emphasises the value of this work, “From the time I saw Saraf’s work I was compelled to buy it, I did not think about the price or anything. It is definitely one of our most important works. I wanted to buy it because it spoke about the history of India’s freedom struggle. It was about the faces that are missing. How are we going to remember these people if we do not commemorate them?”

I always had this connection with textiles, and every time I saw contemporary artists using textiles, it really lit my heart up,” says Sharan Apparao, curator and gallerist

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Apparao finds the techniques and weaves of many of Doshi’s textile-based works most compelling. Born in Kerala, 32-year-old Amjum Rizve creates his own universe through art and craft experiments. He sketches on silk and then the work is embroidered with cotton, satin, glass beads etc, and through his work he explores the old methods of trade embroidery. Many of these young artists are transforming old stitching and weaving techniques and are thus revitalising them and making them contemporary. For example, while the Das Mahavidyas (a group of ten tantric goddesses) made on Chamba rumals might appear old, they were created in 2023. The Chamba rumals were made before weddings and were used to cover the dowry that a bride took to the groom’s house. This double-sided embroidery from Himachal Pradesh had nearly seeped into oblivion, but the Craft Council helped revive it by getting art­ists to create a range of Chamba rumals on a variety of themes, and the delicate Das Mahavidya best illustrates the finesse and delicacy of this intricate art form.

Doshi believes that textile-based art is finally having its (long-delayed) moment. She says, “Textile art has become a rage and a craze globally. If you went to the Venice Biennale—textile art was a rage. There were rooms highlighting textiles, from different regions and of different techniques.” While in India, we have been too quick to classify textile art as ‘craft,’ with greater awareness that hierarchy is being collapsed. The Woven Path shows how textile-based art can be as minimal as black lines on a white background, it can be as embellished as embroidered garments of women. It can be as straightforward as a beadwork awning and it can be as political as Deena Pindoria’s Peace and Violence made from natural dyes on modal silk. Known for her anti-war series, Pindoria’s work from afar might seem like but­terflies but when seen from closer we notice the war planes and their contrails ascending into the skies. Born in 1991, Pindoria uses her in-depth knowledge of Ajrakh block printing, natural dyes, and earth pigments on materials like modal silk, cotton to recreate combat scenes. Pindoria’s juxtaposition of old print techniques with contemporary subjects shows both the potency and potential of textile-based art. And The Woven Path lights the way.

(The Woven Path: textile and fibre-based art from the Saloni Doshi collection, curated by Sharan Apparao, runs at Space118 Art Foundation, Mumbai, till December 21)

About The Author

Nandini Nair

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