Breaking silos | Sense and Sensibility highlights the voices of textile craftspeople, designers and artists

In a year that saw several narratives around textiles, Sense and Sensibility attempted to blur the lines between artists, craftspeople, and designers

The lines between craft, art, and design are blurring now more than ever before. Artisanal techniques, once seen as the antithesis of “cool”, are gaining ground in art and design circles.

Last year saw several narratives around textile, helping transform them into powerful tools of inquiry into cultural identity and sustainability. Exhibitions such as When Indian Flowers Bloomed in Distant Lands (on view in Ahmedabad until March) highlighted the political and economic importance of textiles in India’s global trade, while From Folk to Fibre — featured at the ‘Journeying Across the Himalayas’ festival in December under the Royal Enfield Social Mission — celebrated the myths, stories, and social bonds woven into textiles from nine Himalayan regions.

Reimagined by a new wave of artisans, designers, and craftspeople, these showcases challenged traditional biases in textile storytelling, offering unique perspectives on social, environmental and cultural concerns.

Sense and Sensibility, a showcase by Bengaluru-based research and study centre The Registry of Sarees (TRS) at last month’s Raw Collaborative exhibition in Gandhinagar, invited viewers to see textiles not just as objects, but as extensions of identity, prompting reflections on personal and collective narratives. Ahalya Matthan, founder of TRS, describes it as “an exploration of human interactions”.

She adds, “There is a divisiveness [between art and craft], though it isn’t always acknowledged. Exhibitions like this place the onus on us to tell the story inclusively, highlighting not just craft, art, and design, but the people behind them — their processes, materiality, and skill.”

Curated by textile designers and researchers Aayushi Jain, Vishwesh Surve, and Radha Parulekar, the exhibition breaks from academic rigour to explore themes of community, empathy, and collective identity. Textile history is often shaped by academicians and experts, while the vernacular voices, particularly those of contemporary stakeholders such as weavers and designers, remain largely sidelined. By amplifying these perspectives, TRS aims to build a knowledge registry that addresses the environmental, economic, and sociological challenges textiles present in modern life.

Nearly 100 works from 36 designers, artists, darners, collectors and community-led initiatives participated, the works on display tracing a continuum of influences: from industrialisation and Art Deco to Bauhaus, minimalism, sustainability, and technology. Be it monochrome ikat, brocade and jamdani artworks by designer duo David Abraham and Rakesh Thakore, Kutchi torans from collector Salim Wazir’s private collection, heirloom Banarasi brocades showcased at the Festival of India exhibitions in the 1980s and 90s, Toda embroidery from the pastoral people of Nilgiris, or 17th-19th century carpets from Iran and Iraq from Bengaluru-based collector Danny Mehra’s collection.