In his works, Ajit Kumar Das (b.1957) braids two strands of artistic practices: one, his profound artisanal knowledge and skills in traditional textile, which he acquired during his decades-long professional association with the Weavers' Service Centres (WSCs) as a master-craftsman, and the other, his ambition and aesthetic aspiration to use the traditional medium of textile for creative self-expression. The exhibition of his recent works, most of which the artist has not shown before, is centred around nature, which is understood both as the blameless beauty of natural worlds –birds, seasons and flowers – and the penchant for natural fabric and dyes in which his aesthetic choice for medium finds a deeper connection to the contemporary discourse of ecology and sustainability.
Ajit Kumar Das was born in Tripura to a humble traditional washerman family. He grew up surrounded by tubs of water and clothes, often naturally dyed in bright orange for the local Vaishnava people and mendicants. Natural colours' beauty and unique smells, which spurned his early interest in textiles, grew stronger over time, leading him to become one of India's finest artists working in natural dye. His works, which delight us with their simplicity and visual charm, strike a delicate balance between the honesty and delicacy of traditional art and the urge of an individual artist for experimentation and creative imagination. His hand-painted fabric works on display simultaneously enchant and assure us, making us feel at home in the rapidly changing, perilous world.
In the early 1970s, Das moved to Bengal from Tripura, joining a block printing factory at Serampore, famous for its craft in Eastern India. In Serampore and, later, in WSCs, where he worked for more than four decades in different provinces – Gujarat, Assam and Bengal – he immersed himself in the rich, re-rejuvenated world of Indian handmade textiles, learning the elaborate and intricate methods directly from the master artisans across the country. While in Ahmedabad, he excelled in Sodagori Block Printing and took in-depth lessons in Kalamkari under legendary J Gurappa Chetty and M Kailasam in Andhra Pradesh. Adapting artisan skills and knowledge to meet the modern urban demands in India and abroad was the trait of several post-independence government-run craft institutions, including the WSCs founded in 1956. Combining the earlier Swadeshi spirit of revivalism with the new modernist outlook of the Nehruvian era, the WSCs aimed to modernize Indian handloom and handmade textiles and give them a contemporary relevance. A vibrant institute for research, education and experimentation, it brought into its folds many influential cultural figures, from Pupul Jayakar and Mulk Raj Anand to KG Subramaniyan and Gautam Vaghela, opening up a fertile space for collaboration between the finest traditional artisans and art school-trained fine artists. The desire to create a living and modern textile art for India was infused into Das's artistic ambition early on, informing the aesthetics behind his work throughout his life.
Shy and soft-spoken but a keen listener and learner, Ajit Kumar Das has befriended many people across the art and craft worlds. Gautam Vaghela and legendary craft revivalist and textile conservator Martand Singh were amongst the first to recognize his artistic talents, and they encouraged him to pursue an independent career as a creative artist parallel to his regular job. Delighted to see the brilliance of his use of natural colours and the resonance of traditional textile art in his innovative textile works, Martand Singh showed his work at the historic Vishwakarma Exhibition in London in 1982. In 1985, he again chose his Ambi (Paisley) and Bird Motifs, done in collaboration with Tansukh Mahicha, who he called his Guru, for the textile Festival in Sweden. During this time, the birds and the natural world began to dominate his pictorial imagination, relegating the decorative impulse of the traditional Kalamkari art to a corner. Besides this, his interactions with eminent artists like Haku Shah, KG Subramanyan, and Riten Mozumdar significantly influenced his artistic development. Instead of imitating the patterns and designs, their insistence on understanding traditional art forms' complex schemes, chromatic relation, and rationale helped him rediscover their potential, diffuse and transform them to create his style.
By a large pond, which supplies ample water necessary to prepare naturally dyed textiles and hosts birds in its water and surrounding greenery, Ajit Kumar Das works in his studio in Birati, observing the beauty of nature. Although he observes nature closely, it does not appear as a factual, faithful representation in his works. Instead, it takes on an unworldly lyrical beauty, as if the whole work were the song of a bird. Nature does not exist only outside; the bird often sings within, in the ever-blooming trees of the mind.
Arkaprava Bose
