In a nook of The Aguad, Goa, stands a black velvet feminine model, on which is draped a metallic bikini-armour — a helmet with bison horns on its head, a curtain of chain mail overlaying the crotch. Behind it’s a giant poster exhibiting a mannequin sporting the identical costume, with the addition of bat-wings splayed out from her backbone.
On the ongoing Prinseps exhibition, Bharat Via the Lens of Bhanu Athaiya, we realise this too is the good artist and costume designer’s creation. However for what mission might she have made it? Intrigue dissolves into laughter as curator Brijeshwari Kumar Gohil reveals that Athaiya put the costume collectively as a part of the enduring JVC Onida “satan” advert marketing campaign in 1996.
Iconic is a phrase that has adopted Bhanu Rajopadhye Athaiya for years now. Born in 1920 in Kolhapur into the household of the royal priest, she demonstrated an affinity for the humanities and crafts, spurred on by her father who practised carpentry and portray; and after his dying, her mom who would ship her to Mumbai to pursue her expertise. She studied artwork and artwork historical past on the J.J. College of Arts, and was the primary girl to be invited to be a part of the Bombay Progressive Arts Group — she had a seat on the desk together with Fashionable Indian artwork’s best luminaries like F.N. Souza and S.H. Raza.
For many years, Athaiya has been relegated to little greater than a footnote in Indian artwork historical past — the reply to “who was the primary ever Oscar-winner from India” normally information books. A reckoning along with her legacy has been lengthy overdue, if you happen to ask her daughter Radhika Gupta, who has been laborious on the job of salvaging and preserving what’s left of her legacy — worn down by time and a white ant infestation — for over 4 years.
“My mom had trunks stuffed with archival materials and needed to bequeath it to somebody,” Gupta says. “Sadly, she discovered no person who was . One particular person from a ministry did inform us, ‘Aap yahan chhod jao, hum dekhenge kya kar sakte hain [you can leave it here, we’ll see what we can do].’ My mom very firmly instructed me, ‘I’ll set fireplace to it reasonably than give it away like this.’”
When popular culture met artwork historical past
At The Aguad, a museum housed within the Port and Jail complicated, you may see the outcomes of this painstaking work, which has been enthusiastically inspired by Prinseps proprietor Indrajit Chatterji, and to whom Gupta has signed over Athaiya’s property. You additionally stroll previous show circumstances with silk saris from her personal assortment and leaves of a short-lived trend journal from Bombay referred to as Eve’s Weekly, along with her hand-drawn sketches.
You witness carefully-preserved costumes on mannequins, akin to the enduring orange sari for Mumtaz from Brahmachari — the prototype of the now-popular idea sari, and a technological marvel for incorporating the zip for a performer’s consolation.
“Once we had been finding out Bhanu Athaiya’s archives, the household pictures, private paraphernalia, costumes and sketches, the one factor that got here by means of is that India is the land that impressed her,” Gohil says, explaining the theme of the exhibition. “Proper now, India is being spoken about a lot, when it comes to design, craft, textile, artwork, luxurious. And you’ve got this one that made the nation cool in all these methods 60 years in the past!” Certainly, a survey of her work throughout a whopping 240 movies — starting with Devendra Goel’s Aas in 1953, proper as much as Jaypraad Desai’s Marathi language Nagrik in 2015 — reveals her to be that uncommon determine in standard tradition who had an artwork historian’s eye and a researcher’s rigour.
First of many interventions
If sartorialism was Athaiya’s lens to showcase a post-Independence India, then the physique was undoubtedly her canvas. Particularly the feminine kind that remained a supply of inspiration for her — a trajectory that may be traced again to her days as a younger artist, in award-winning work akin to Woman in Repose.
“Have a look at among the western costumes she designed. She was very observant the place the actor’s our bodies had been involved. Whether or not it was a drape or silhouette or materials, she would use a sure cloth that would intensify an individual’s curviness with out making them look hyped up,” says Gohil.
The actor Zeenat Aman, who labored on 16 movies in 15 years with Athaiya, was at The Aguad. She confirmed that Athaiya did have a model made in her picture, and admitted that the costumes she designed did a good quantity of the work for her characters. She remembered Athaiya as a mild-mannered, light however meticulous drive who dominated this fledgling trade — certainly elicited larger recognition for it.
Bharat Via the Lens of Bhanu Athaiya is certainly one of many interventions that Prinseps has deliberate to decorate her legacy in mainstream reminiscence. The workforce is at the moment exploring the potential for donating a few of her sketches to the Victoria & Albert Museum, London, whereas Gohil is wanting into Athaiya’s Shakespearean influences, given her work in theatre of which little or no is understood.
Subsequent up is a large-scale present in Mumbai in 2024, “a kind of homecoming present”. Chatterji is eager to digitally recreate, with AI probably, the Calico trend present of 1958, to which Athaiya was invited by theatre director Ebrahim Alkazi. The concepts are many and flying quick. How will they not when, as Chatterji places it, “Athaiya was trend earlier than there was trend.”
The exhibition is on until January 1 at The Aguad.
The author is an impartial journalist based mostly in Mumbai, writing on tradition, way of life and expertise.