This exhibition looks at India’s 75-year textile legacy with innovation as the focus

By Anannya Sarkar
01 September, 2022

This exhibition looks at India’s 75-year textile legacy with innovation as the focus

By Anannya Sarkar
01 September, 2022

Sutr Santati: Then. Now. Next looks at innovation through the lens of history to present mindful collaborations

Much, much before Maria Grazia Chiuri of Dior started collaborating with Mumbai-based atelier Chanakya International and the products of the nimble fingers at the Chanakya School of Craft found pride of place at her couture shows, India’s craftspersons have been weaving their own textile legacy, one that has largely gone unnoticed by the world. In fact, India’s textile heritage is as diverse as the subcontinent itself, with wars having been fought over its riches and Mahatma Gandhi drawing on its pride for our freedom struggle against the British Raj. But soon after Independence, India witnessed its own journey from having to reassert its textile legacy all over again to the present day, when textiles are having their well-deserved moment in the sun. Telling their story is an ambitious exhibition titled ‘Sutr Santati: Then. Now. Next.’, presented by The National Museum New Delhi and the Abheraj Baldota Foundation that is on till 20 September.

Legacy and heritage

Speaking to The Established from the sidelines of the exhibition, designer Ritu Kumar recollects: “When I started my work in the 1960s, it was an absolute desert as everything in India had disappeared. You couldn’t find a print or a weave or an embroidery, for love or money because the British systematically rid the country of its textile heritage for 200 years. We all got into a slightly nationalistic fervour as we looked around, trying to see where we could revive what. To see what we have achieved in the last 75 years was so energetic to witness.” And energising the narrative is what curator and textile revivalist Lavina Baldota was aiming for with the second edition of the Santiti exhibition, as the entire project was driven by the need of both looking back and taking it forward to preserve this rich legacy.

“Textile has been an important part of India’s legacy for many years and I was always very inspired by Gandhiji’s initiative to tie it with the freedom movement. What better way to celebrate 75 years of India’s freedom than to show the crafts of today in a new language?” says Baldota, who went on to curate and commission an ambitious 100 pieces for this exhibition. Drawing from the name, ‘Sutr Santiti’ translates into ‘the continuation of the yarn,’ and this legacy has been shown through textiles created using processes such as hand-weaving, embroidery, resist-dyeing, printing, painting and appliqué, among other forms of yarn and fabric manipulation. Kandu, Kala cotton, mulberry, wild silks, camel and sheep wool, goat and yak hair, lotus, banana and water hyacinth are some of the fibres commissioned for the pieces in this exhibition. “As the scope of the exhibition promises, the pieces reflect on the past with a keen eye on the future,” adds Baldota.

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