Foreign artists showcase various aspects of Indian culture

While London-based fashion textile designer Vanessa Natalie Lovell is preparing to debut her textile collection at London Fashion Week next February, Australian artist David Brazier is planning a trip to the Taj Mahal along with his two children. What unites these two individuals is their love for Indian culture and tradition.

Lovell and Brazier showcased their multi-media artwork during a one-day exhibition titled "Associate Residencies" organised at Khoj Studios in the national capital on Sunday.

For the exhibition, Lovell has sourced hundreds of Indian textiles, handlooms and embroideries from places like Nehru Place and Shahpur Jat in New Delhi to cloth factories and shops in Jaipur and have then woven these together to create three hanging tapestries that give both an immersive and tactile experience to the viewer.

"I am half Polish and have always been attracted by the colourful, gypsy-like weaves and embroideries. I always wanted to explore the amazingly diverse textile traditions of India and most fond of chikankari, block printing, kantha work and banjara embroidery," Lovell, 24, told IANS.

Brazier showcased three video works apart from photographs. One of his videos features conversations with labourers in Malaviya Nagar that reveal the social hierarchy within the handicraft industry while his second video showcases a free-for-all art-wrestling completion set up in Khirkee Extension's bylanes. His third video features students of acting who were part of an "accent neutralisation" study group to show how Indians have become a homogeneous group belonging well and truly to a global workforce.

"I am interested in looking at issues of identity and displacement. And even though language was a barrier, through drawings and signs, we were able to communicate with each other. I have done a similar project in London before and this simple game reveals the true and hidden nature of a person," Brazier, who has been in India since 2009 as part of a British Council-Khoj collaboration, noted.

--IANS

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