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Threads of Celebration (Red/Blue/Yellow )
Threads of Celebration (Red/Blue/Yellow )
Medium - Textile assemblage constructed from block-printed and hand-embroidered cotton, a repurposed blanket backing from a bedcover set, curtain-cord ties, and machine stitching.
Dimensions - 48x96"
Description of Artwork:
Threads of Celebration transforms a richly colored block-printed and embroidered cotton bedspread into a ceremonial public-art drape. Its red, gold, ochre, and deep-blue palette, together with its repeating floral, geometric, and figurative motifs, evokes festivity, energy, abundance, and the visual richness of Indian textile traditions.
The textile has been structurally supported with a repurposed blanket from a coordinated bedcover set. Curtain cords attached to the backing allow the work to be secured around the sculpture while protecting the decorative surface. The extended front panel carries the embroidered patterns forward and gives the drape a more ceremonial presence because it'll adorn the forehead and trunk of the elephant..
The title recognizes both the many individual threads of its embroidery and the spirit of celebration created when color, pattern, handwork, heritage, and community are brought together.
Artist Statement
Artist Statement
Coming to art after decades in medicine, I am drawn to transformation, memory, healing, and the ways materials carry lived experience. My mixed-media practice brings together painting, collage, texture, fabric, and handwork.
As an Indian American artist raised in Kolkata, I return frequently to color, pattern, textiles, and ornamentation as carriers of personal and cultural memory. For Draped in Heritage, I reimagined two domestic textiles as public art. I preserved the original fabrics through folding, layering, and structural support rather than cutting them apart, allowing their earlier identities to remain visible.
This process parallels The Great Elephant Migration’s transformation of invasive lantana into monumental art. I hope these drapes honor Indian textile traditions, Indigenous artisanship, conservation, coexistence, and the possibility of giving familiar materials a new form, purpose, and public life.
Pictures: Work in Progress
Pictures: Work in Progress
Pictures: Draped on Elephants
Pictures: Draped on Elephants
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