Tag Archives: India

The Warp & The Weft

20 Wednesday Feb 2019

Posted by in Fashion & Style, Features & Trends, Publication: Taj Magazine, Sustainability

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Published: Taj Magazine, Volume 2, 2018-19

India’s once vibrant and sustainable textile ecosystem may have receded with the drifts of social, economic and political change. A new vigour brought about by a revivified contemporary aesthetic may yet turn the tide, says Sitanshi Talati-Parikh.

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The rich texture of thousands of years of Indian culture seeps in like a natural, yet permanent dye in its fabric and woven traditions. It is a symbolic thread that connects the nation in its diversity; perhaps a striking case where tradition marks culture, where craft describes history and where colours speak of the passage of time —of lives lived and memories created.

Weaves, threadwork and textile decoration, among other indigenous crafts spin yarns —even if coloured with the emotions of the artisans — describing the local life. Influenced deeply by the local socio-economic-political environment, but also linked to moments of celebration, like festivals and weddings. The craft, in some cases, has been a rite of passage: a woman decorates her own trousseau that becomes a part of the dowry she takes with her when she gets married.

While over centuries, communities have survived because of their traditional crafts, these have faced erosion in many ways. As Gautam Vazirani, strategist and curator — sustainable fashion at IMG Reliance/ Lakmé Fashion Week, points out, “Many of our local techniques have changed in the last few decades in terms of authenticity of practice, either at the raw material level or in the original process, or in the woven design approach. Only true craft connoisseurs and historians can highlight the state of many languishing crafts today.”

Shefalee Vasudev, the editor of The Voice of Fashion, a digital destination that explores the intersection of fashion and culture, finds that while there are crafts slipping away from us for varied reasons, perhaps not everything needs to be sustained simply because it once existed. She says, “It has to be seen what can be produced, created and have a sense of utilitarian as well as aesthetic value in the contemporary arts and crafts scenario and then sustained or revived.”

The Changing Colours of Dyes

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Until the late 19th century, the art of natural dyeing—using natural sources like plants, insects or shellfish—thrived in the Indian subcontinent. Indigo (derived from the indigofera flowering plant) lends itself to the fantastical peacock-plume tones of the country. In the 19th century, Bengal was the world’s main source of indigo. The advent of aniline dyes in 1856 by British scientist William Henry Perkin, and their spread to colonial countries, led to post-independence India no longer retaining its tradition of natural dyes with the exception of a few rural communities.

Revival movements in the 1970s by social reformer and freedom fighter Kamaladevi Chattopadhyay and in the 1990s by activist and advocate for craft and natural dyes, Ruby Ghuznavi, initiated the change. But the discovery in 2009 by Dr Himadri Debnath, deputy director of the Botanical Survey of India in Kolkata, of a unique 15-volume set (with 3,500 samples) of Specimens of Fabrics Dyed with Indian Dyes, compiled by British Victorian dyer Thomas Wardle, and believed to have been lost, was pathbreaking to understanding the rich history of natural dyes in India.

Today, conscious designers are willing to pick up the mantle once more. Kolkata-based Maku has brought back the splendour of natural indigo, and brands like Delhi-based 11.11/eleven eleven and Ahmedabad-based Soham Dave only use natural dyes; while Colours of Nature (Auroville) collaborated with Levi’s to launch the first truly organic 511 jeans made with organic indigo dye and local cotton yarn in 2013.

The Art of Fabric Decoration

In contemporary times, industrialised, machine-made versions have largely replaced India’s traditional, rich and varied embroidery forms. The art was popular during the Mughal empire, and Indian floral motifs have influenced British embroidery, including the popular paisley shawls. Colonial demand subsequently led to mass-production and reduction of the handcrafted process which could take months.

Not restricted to garments, forms of embroidery appear on wallhangings, home furnishings, fashion accessories and textiles. Mostly inspired by nature and local life, prints and thread-work would create patterns in vibrant colours often embellished with zari (precious gold or silver thread-work) or varak (precious gold or silver foiling). Genuine varak printing on fabric is very rare today and reportedly there are only two artisans in Jaipur who still practice the art.

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As handmade items are reclaimed as new embodiments of luxury, and local runways are reviving many of the handcrafted techniques, many of these old decorative textile styles have been lost forever—like the Tanjore paintings on fabric using precious materials, which have inspired many offshoots but are no longer available in their original form. The Kodali Karuppura saris, created in a small town in Tamil Nadu, mainly for the Thanjavur nobility, have, Vasudev points out, completely vanished. The hand-painted and naturally-dyed textile flourished under the patronage of the Maratha rulers of Tanjore—today, a few samples can be seen in museums in India and abroad.

While designers like Kolkata-based Sabyasachi Mukherjee and Mumbai-based Anita Dongre have taken up the mantle of India’s embroidery tradition—Dongre has found a way to contemporarise it with brocade dresses and traditional embroidery on western silhouettes—the local craft has also found glamour on international runways. Belgian couturier Dries van Noten has had an embroidery workshop in Kolkata since 1987, while brands like Valentino, Gucci, Givenchy, Balmain, Ralph Lauren and Christian Dior, among many others, work with Mumbai-based trade embroidery companies to this day.

The gara style of embroidery on traditional Parsi saris had been losing popularity and been replaced by machine-made versions—due in part to the diminishing Parsi community and the painstaking process—until there was a renewed interest in the form, along with its use on accessories and the modernizing efforts by designers like Ashdeen Lilaowala. Even as insurgency hit the supply of local craft, Srinagarand-Delhi-based Kashmir Loom by Asaf Ali and Jenny Housego has, successfully contemporized their traditional handwork on cashmere shawls, by incorporating global colours and designs with the age-old techniques, in what they state is, “Preserving heritage while fostering its progress.”

The art of Kalamkari (drawing with a pen) includes stories and mythological tales told on fabric using natural dyes. Kolkata-based designer, Divya Sheth, brings back nature-inspired kalamkari work on her runway pieces.

Sheth says of the experience, “I have had the chance to witness the joy and ease with which the artisans create their masterpieces. The ladies start painting once they complete their daily chores.”

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Handloom Tales

With minister of textiles, Smriti Irani, throwing her support behind Indian handlooms, and the shutterbugs catching the likes of Indian cinema veterans Kangana Ranaut, Sonam Kapoor and Vidya Balan in handloom saris, one accepts that the loom is in focus again and this time, not with the elements that defined the ‘Khadi’ look.

The charkha, or the handloom spinning wheel has a strong symbolic element: while it suggests economic empowerment, it is also an element of the country’s freedom struggle representing self-sufficiency, as well as unity and alliance—it forms the crux between an ecosystem of farmers, weavers, distributors, and consumers.

Among the nomads of Ladakh or in the hills of Kashmir, life and the act of weaving are deeply linked. For instance, in Ladakh, the woven cloth is linked to the birth of a child, where the warp (representing the man) and the weft (the woman) in harmony lead to the creation of new life. And yet, there is a long way to go for the new lease of life of the handloom garment.

Today, Indian artisans are facing a tremendous challenge from the advent of the power loom and machine-made garments. For instance, much of the famous Kota Doria textile in Kota, Rajasthan, is being woven without the real sari (that was a signature material) and the fabric itself is being made in power loom and not in the traditional handloom (for commercial reasons). However, as Vazirani points out, Craftmark’s initiative with Kota Women Weavers is in the process of reviving traditional weaving techniques with genuine materials.

Tribal textiles have been impacted, and consequently the local economy. Vazirani, who has worked extensively in the north-eastern region of India, points out that there has been a shift to acrylic yarns and fabric for weaving instead of cotton, silk and wool yarns, with a mutation of woven designs due to changes in cultural, economic and environmental conditions.

Vasudev brings up techniques that may be lost, like the painstaking Dakmanda weave of the Garo tribe in Meghalaya. Even as the industry in the North East has the highest concentration of handlooms in the country—over 53 percent of looms and more than 50 percent of the weavers live in this region—it is fraught with challenges including poor supply chain management.

Vazirani says, “There is a good opportunity to address the challenges and find sustainable solutions through the Action Plan on North-East India Report—an initiative in partnership with the United Nations in India and IMG Reliance—for the mainstream industry.” And as handloom hits the runway, one may also credit the persistent and long-standing efforts of conscious designers.

For instance, designers like New Delhi-based Rajesh Pratap Singh revert to the old traditional techniques—setting up the loom to make the garment and weaving it from the start. In fact, when Singh’s looms are empty, he uses it to make saris to ensure sustainability not only of craft and thread but also of the iconic garment. Designers like Delhi-based David Abraham and Rakesh Thakore of label Abraham & Thakore and Rahul Misra; as well as labels like Bodice, which won the 2017/18 International Woolmark prize for womenswear, and Raw Mango are among the many designers adopting handmade textiles and handcrafted garments. Misra’s motto is clear on his website: “My objective is to create jobs which help people in their own villages, I take work to them rather than calling them to work for me. If villages are stronger you will have a stronger country, a stronger nation, and a stronger world.”

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The Frugality of Fashion

An intrinsic part of indigenous craft used to be the considered use of materials. Cyclical production was a part of the natural ethos of the communities, as what was made was in direct relation to demand. In India, such thrift is not new: saris and dupattas are used in the manner in which they come off the loom, while designs like ponchos and kalidar clothes are constructed keeping the wastage of fabric to a minimum.

And yet, today, approximately 120 billion square metres of fabric end up as waste in India, China and Bangladesh alone, not including garment rejections during quality checks. Knowing this, Delhi-based Kriti Tula of label Doodlage says she upcycles up to 600 kilograms of waste fabric every month. Designers like Karishma Shahani Khan, the founder of Pune-based label Ka-Sha, in her ‘Heart to Haat’ ideology works with her own scrap and that of industry friends’ material in footwear, stuffed toys, embroidery, patchwork, macramé and bags.

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The State of Workers

While sustainability in terms of keeping craft and knowledge and enterprise alive is important—we are constantly reminded of Mahatma Gandhi’s words: “There is no beauty in the finest cloth if it makes hunger and unhappiness.” A year-long research project called the Garment Worker Diaries that included field study in Bengaluru, India, reported on the sorry state of the garment workers; mostly women.

Long hours, being forced to do more work than their allotted quota, lower pay and verbal abuse were unveiled in the report. In 2013, the collapse of the Rana Plaza building in Bangladesh—which housed five garment factories supplying global brands—saw the death of 1138 people while 2500 were injured, which should be a sufficient wake-up call for the fashion industry.

Today, designers are reportedly making attempts to work directly with cooperatives, like Mumbai-based brand Kishmish with NGO Kala Swaraj and designer Samant Chauhan for the cause of master weavers in his native Bhagalpur, in Bihar. Reportedly, Gaurang Shah works with over 700 weavers across India and The Goodloom by GOCOOP enables a direct connection between handloom cooperatives and artisans. There is a growing, if nascent, push towards better labour and environmental standards and more transparent supply chains, with the advent of global organizations like Fashion Revolution in India.

Demand and Supply

Vasudev points out that the general awareness of what sustainability in fashion means is very poor, and it slants merely towards that which is organic and natural. She believes that to say India is realigning itself towards sustainability would be a premature remark because the masses are not aligned with it. “The sustainability manifestos are lost; they have to be brought together and pushed in a contemporary format and I do not see that happening very much, even as the sustainability argument is staggered with clued-in fashion designers and manufacturers,” says Vasudev.

While it hasn’t reached mainstream consumption, consciousness is growing among a certain audience, as awareness continues to increase. Niche retailers like Paper Boat Collective in Goa, Toile in Mumbai and pan-India brands like Good Earth Sustain and Nicobar make attempts in individual ways to be mindful— in choice of products, materials and packaging. The Auroville market in Pondicherry supports a sustainable ethic—supply and demand work in tandem with mindfully crafted goods versus mass-produced ones.

And so, we may hope that more people begin to lean towards what Vazirani strives for: “An awakening and appreciation of the wealth we have in our country in terms of our artisans and the beautiful textiles that they are capable of weaving without any luxury facilities or formal education. An understanding of who we are, when we say Indian fashion, and establishing our own independent sense of style. It is feeling of pride in wearing the Khadi shirt, or the handwoven Indigo-dyed dress, or the Dabu hand-printed saree instead of a Western high-street outfit. Nowhere in the world can we get access to the luxury of genuine handmade as we still do in India.”

We can also work toward a socially conscious and sustainable fashion ethic so that Indian fashion undergoes a shift towards what Vazirani calls a “fashion consciousness—where what you wear makes a commitment to a higher ideal beyond its hanger value or glamour.”

Link to PDF of the story. The Warp and the Weft – Taj Magazine 2019

The Bright Side of Sunny

02 Thursday Aug 2018

Posted by in Features & Trends, Publication: The Voice of Fashion

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Published: The Voice of Fashion, July 31, 2018 as “Sunny Leone’s Business Calendar”

Sunny Leone, Canadian-born Indian-American actress, model, entrepreneur and former porn star represents the intriguing sexual freedom that Indians lack. Today, 37-year-old Leone—who gave up her adult film career in 2013, a year after her Bollywood debut with Pooja Bhatt’s erotic thriller Jism 2—has a string of brand endorsements, splashed across buses, billboards, dailies, television channels and going viral on the Internet. She is the star of her autobiographical web series, Karenjit Kaur – The Untold Story of Sunny Leone which released last month on Zee5. Overt sexuality has always had a tenuous relationship with Indian society. In a country where sex is considered entertainment—albeit behind closed doors, or bawdy and obscene when explored in public—there is a vicarious pleasure in watching, being associated with and fantasising about someone who is willing to bare it all. But is that all there is?

The face of causes
The anti-smoking ad film, 11 Minutes (2016) captures Leone’s appeal in India through the last wish of a man (theatre actor Deepak Dobriyal) dying of the consequences of cigarette smoking. He wants to be with a woman: Leone arrives like an oft-rendered caricature of a coy village bride. The public-service campaign—which uses stereotypes to engage, and set the stage for the anti-climax—crossed one million views on YouTube in 48 hours, reaching two million views in three days, as reported on media and advertising news site, Afaqs!. And that is not surprising, given that Leone—who incidentally doesn’t smoke—has been, on more than one occasion, the most Google-searched person in India.

The female bosom forms the story behind Leone’s public service campaign #DetectToDefeat (2016) by digital media channel Aur Dikhao, to promote breast cancer awareness. The ad captures the deeply uncomfortable male gaze in India, ending with a, presumably, topless Leone looking into the mirror, saying: “If we women paid as much attention to our breasts as men do, breast cancer cases would reduce to half.”

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Leone has been associated for almost six years with People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) India. Her 2017 campaign has her, with musician-husband Daniel Weber, in what has been described on the PETA site as “wearing little more than high heels and tattoos between them,” advocating “Ink Not Mink.” On the effectiveness of Leone as an endorser, Sachin Bangera, associate director of celebrity and public relations, PETA India, says: “Calls and emails started pouring in after (Sunny) Leone’s campaign on the adoption of homeless dogs and cats, asking us about the procedure to do so. Close to 15,000 people joined the online campaign to help ailing elephant Gajraj after Leone shared his condition on social media. Gajraj has since been rescued.”

The power of titillation
While Leone’s persona drives the public service campaigns, it is the interest and controversies sparked over her Manforce condom ads playing on objectification of the female body, which fuel her power as a headline-grabber. On the Manforce condoms’ official YouTube channel, Leone’s popularity is on the rise: their 2014 dotted condoms ad with Leone shows over 3.1 million views in four years, while their flavoured condoms ad, Man Kyun Behka, from last year clocked over 2.2 million views in one year alone.

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Besides being an entrepreneur and the face for her own line of clothes, perfume (Lust) and makeup (Star Struck launched March 2018 and is PETA-certified), Leone has endorsed a wide range of products that include Chase mobile phones, Iarra sunglasses, Dholpur Fresh desi ghee, energy drinks like Gold Fogg by R Z International and XXX by Viiking Ventures, online jewellery portal Jewelsouk.com, Big Boy Toyz pre-owned sports and luxury cars, and Mehak Kesar Shilajit pan masala. The “A” grade luxury brands may not touch her with a pole but new FMCG brands evidently find her attractive.

Veteran celebrity photographer, Dabboo Ratnani, who has worked with Sunny Leone, regularly gets requests from people asking for an introduction to her. “Leone’s endorsement creates a strong image change for the brand—she effectively challenges the status quo, immediately creating a buzz,” says Ratnani. Speaking about the Gold Fogg energy drink campaign, Rahul Vinakiya, managing director, R Z International, has said on Afaqs!, “We opted for (Sunny) Leone as our brand ambassador as she perfectly suits our brand tagline ‘Live Your Way’. She completely believes in living life on her terms.” Says Leone in an article in the Indian Express this year, “I don’t think I have ever done my work worrying about people judging me.”

Leone who has grown up playing street hockey with the boys and is, as of last year, the co-owner and brand ambassador of Premier Futsal franchise Kerala Cobras, puts her game face on for Torque Pharmaceuticals’ JAL mineral water. In the ad film, a clean-faced, pony-tailed Leone is described by a male voice-over as, “a diva, a fighter, on the top of her game.” The video ends with a camera focusing on ever-so-bouncy breasts in the background and the bottle in the foreground with Leone saying: “Kyunki, jal hi jeevan hai” (Because water is life).

Veteran image guru, Dilip Cherian, finds that Leone checks all the three boxes to be a successful brand endorser: ‘Risqué’ value, resonance and reach. “Leone is someone who has confronted the reality of who she is. Her risqué factor is 9.8—there is nothing further to be revealed, and therefore the downside is zero. Her name has resonance and her reach is global and immense.” But above all, in an era where the smartphone has brought porn into every home, Leone represents the new reality of openness in Indian society. He says, “She is a woman to boldly go where no man has gone.” As Leone notes, in her web series, in response to the question about how some Indians can’t differentiate between a prostitute and a porn star, “There is one similarity…guts.”

The girl next door
Leone—who is admittedly bisexual—is a girl you can take home to your mother. Shocking as that may sound, keeping her fair, chiselled face and the in-your-face augmented breasts aside, probably a part of her appeal, locally, lies in her easy “next-doorness”. Her web series suggests that she is just another girl, ridiculed in school, who made a tough—and unorthodox—choice. With 13.9 million followers on her Instagram, what you gauge from Leone’s posts is a girl who separates her work life from her personal life. There are stuffed toys, pink roses for Valentine’s Day, goofy moments, and gym snapshots. She demystifies her work life, by capturing the steamy visuals with little jokes: a behind-the-scenes picture of her in a bathtub from the shoot of the reality survival show Man vs Wild, has the tongue-in-cheek caption: “Just lying around at work”. Her styling has mass appeal, she is not a star with sharp dance moves or serious acting chops, but her aura—a “good” girl who knows when and how to be “bad”—circumvents it all, and allows her to reign in the over-a-crore-price-tag endorsement category.

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Leone, born Karenjit Kaur Vohra, married Weber in 2011. She posts photos of them as a regular couple, often remarking on how “handsome” he is, or how he is the “sweetest man” she knows. In March 2018, she posted a photo of them in blue jeans and a white tee—a classic all-American family—with their three children, including the newly-born-via-surrogacy twins. At the time of this story, Leone is unable to respond because, as informed by her agent, she has “taken some time off from everything” to be with the children.

We tend to gravitate towards authenticity and Leone’s life, even while rife with Hindu immorality, is real, exciting and aspirational. Not because everyone wants to be a porn star, rather, because she is, like Vinakiya said, living life on her own terms. In a society that imposes restrictions on everything from food to marriage, Leone represents that elusive freedom, all the while being the girl a man would perhaps aspire to have…next door.

A Thread In Time

28 Thursday Jun 2018

Posted by in Fashion & Style, Publication: Mint Lounge, Sustainability

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Published: Mint Lounge, June 23, 2018

Lounge revisits embroidery techniques integral to the Indian craft vocabulary that are also making a mark on the fashion runway

One of India’s most enduring artistic traditions is its myriad forms of embroidery. Every state and region boasts of its own style, but needlework is not merely a means of ornamentation. The fabrics are also threaded with stories of the community, with motifs emerging from its natural surroundings, economic state and sociopolitical milieu.

As handmade items are reclaimed as new embodiments of luxury, many of these old, and sometimes forgotten, embroidery styles are being revived and popularized. These techniques are popular not only among designers in India but also with international labels. Belgian designer Dries van Noten has worked with embroiderers in Kolkata for decades, and Mumbai is a trade hub for a number of luxury brands seeking Indian embroidery. Labels like Gucci, Valentino, Alberta Ferretti, Maison Margiela and Christian Dior work with the Mumbai-based embroidery firm Chanakya, while Roberto Cavalli, Salvatore Ferragamo, Versace and Michael Kors have collaborated with another firm, Adity Designs, also in Mumbai.

In homage to the country’s diverse embroidery traditions, here are some of the techniques that have found new expression in the works of contemporary fashion designers.

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Gara
Integral to the wardrobes of Parsi women, gara embroidery is an amalgamation of influences from India, China, Persia and Europe. Parsi brides traditionally wear gara saris for their wedding, the intricate motifs on fabrics ranging from pagodas and dragons to roses, lotuses, roosters and peacocks.
Fashion take: Turn to designers Ashdeen Z. Lilaowala and Mumbai-based Zenobia S. Davar for a contemporary take on gara embroidery on jackets, kurtis and dupattas. In 2016, the Delhi-based Lilaowala collaborated with textile label Ekaya to create handwoven garaBanarasi silks.

Kashida
Kashida is a popular Kashmiri needlework technique, traditionally used on garments such as stoles, woollen pherans and rugs. Evocative motifs like birds, blossoms, fruits and trees—particularly the chinar—are created, usually in a single-stitch style. Another form of Kashmiri embroidery is aari, wherein floral-inspired motifs are embroidered in fine chain stitches using a hooked needle.
Fashion take: In 2014, Rohit Bal’s Gulbagh collection showcased kashida embroidery while Meera and Muzaffar Ali’s Summer/Resort 2017 collection for Kotwara incorporated aari. Manish Malhotra combined Kashmiri embroidery with Merino wool for his recentInaya collection.

Mirrorwork
Also known as shisha or abhala bharat kaam, this is the craft of encasing mirrors of varying shapes and sizes to create patterns on fabric. Women artisans from Gujarat’s Kutch region and parts of Rajasthan are renowned for their expert mirrorwork, on garments, homeware and accessories, which are also widely exported.
Fashion take: Designers Manish Arora, Malini Ramani, Abu Jani and Sandeep Khosla have employed mirrorwork in their designs. Jani-Khosla’s mirrorwork lehnga for Madhuri Dixit-Nene in Devdas (2002) was also displayed at London’s Victoria and Albert Museum for the Fabric Of India exhibition in 2016.

Phulkari
Phulkari, meaning flower work, was traditionally practised by the women of Punjab in their homes. The designs depict colourful motifs embroidered using a long-and-short darn stitch. A mandatory trousseau item for the community’s women, the craft even found mention in Waris Shah’s 18th century poem Heer Ranjha where phulkari was part of Heer’s trousseau.
Fashion take: Manish Malhotra’s Threads Of Emotion collection was exhibited at the Philadelphia Museum of Art’s Phulkari: The Embroidered Textiles Of Punjab exhibition in 2017. The embroidery is also used on accessories, like juttis by Fizzy Goblet, and stoles, bags and small items by the Chandigarh-based brand 1469.

Kantha
Originally practised by women in rural Bengal and Odisha, kantha was used to create blankets (in Bangla, the word is used interchangeably for the embroidery and the blankets). The patterns, crafted using a simple running stitch, are themed on daily life, floral and animal motifs, and geometric shapes.
Fashion take: Designer Sunita Shanker and label 11.11 by CellDSGN have used modern interpretations of the embroidery technique.

Zardozi
An artful technique of metallic embroidery, zardozi uses fine metal wire or thread in gold and silver (or copper wires and synthetic threads for cost-effective designs), to create patterns on fabrics like velvet, satin and heavy silk. Varying from 3D-like patterns to minimal designs, zardozi is commonly employed in bridalwear and couture.
Fashion take: Spot it in the collections of Ritu Kumar, Suneet Varma,Tarun Tahiliani, Shyamal & Bhumika, and Sabyasachi Mukherjee, among others.

Sujini
This embroidery technique practised by women in rural Bihar is akin to an art form. Outlined in chain stitch and filled with running stitches, sujini is also a means of storytelling. The designs often locate a woman’s place in a patriarchal society, with depiction of social evils like dowry or domestic violence, and also showcase their personal aspirations.
Fashion take: Emerging label Indigene designed a collection of sujini-embroidered garments in 2017, co-created with women artisans from Bihar and Uttar Pradesh, while Delhi-based textile designer Swati Kalsi also collaborates with sujini craftspersons on new designs.

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Mukaish
Popularized in Lucknow, mukaish is created by twisting thin metal strips into fabric. Fardi ka kaam, dotted mukaish embroidery, is done by women, while kamdani, done by men, is used to create varying patterns. The labour- and time-intensive craft has gradually diminished and is today known by only a handful of karigars.
Fashion take: Mukaish can be spotted on runways, courtesy designers like JJ Valaya and Payal Singhal, who incorporated the craft in her Summer/Resort 2018 collection.

Chikankari
Believed to have been introduced in the Mughal court by Noor Jahan, wife of emperor Jahangir, Chikankari is the practice of stitching white untwisted yarn on fine fabrics like muslin, cotton or voile. In recent years, the embroidery is also being done on brightly-hued fabrics or using coloured threads.
Fashion take: Sustain, the apparel line from Good Earth, employs Chikan for its Noor Naira collection on white cotton, Chanderi and Malkha, while Delhi-based designer Sanjay Garg’s collection Cloud People introduces new motifs, such as the figures of angels in the design.

Gota
Indigenous to Rajasthan, where the craft can be seen on lehngas and odhnis as well as turbans, gota refers to strips of gold and silver ribbons that are used to make appliqué patterns on fabrics or butis (small patterns) inspired by local flora, fauna and community life. Originally using precious metals, today’s designs are often made from cheaper copper-coated silver or polyester film known as “plastic gota”.
Fashion take: Anita Dongre, Ridhi Arora and Yogesh Chaudhary incorporate gota in their designs, while The Scarf Story, an accessories label by Joanna Kukreja, has reinterpreted it on cashmere.

 

To The Manner Born: Sonakshi Sinha

05 Monday Aug 2013

Posted by in Interviews (All), Interviews: Cinema, Interviews: Cover Stories, Publication: Verve Magazine

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Published: Verve Magazine, Cover Story, August 2013

Sanskaar is a word often associated with her, she says. Sonakshi Sinha is unabashedly confident, reclusively shy and riding a wave of professional good fortune. The homegrown actor is uncomplicated and easy-going…and quintessentially Indian…

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She is always excruciatingly punctual. Apparently, on set she’s the first one in – ready before even the lighting guys have set up. At magazine shoots, she’s there with at least a couple of minutes to spare. Sonakshi Sinha crashes on the bed of the hotel suite we are shooting in and experiences a ‘lazy’ moment. Indigo skinny jeans, fitted tee and a smart cropped black leather jacket, a faint hint of lipstick and reflector shades complete the biker-chic look.

We chat lightly. Her grilled cheese sandwich and fries are on their way. While she agrees that an Indian woman is meant to be traditionally curvy and voluptuous, you find that she looks surprisingly slimmer in person than she did recently on screen, and her stomach is enviably flat – but her face is as captivating when she breaks into a smile. That smile reaches her large, expressive coffee-brown eyes that are immersive and can sparkle with a mood of their own. When her lip curls in dissatisfaction, it takes you back to her recent role of Pakhi from Vikramaditya Motwane’s Lootera, seared in our memory, as she transcends the elongated scenes in the movie with her emotiveness. She speaks easily, points out that she keeps getting asked certain questions – answers to which she’s “rattoed” (memorised by rote) and admits she enjoyed our little conversation.

The largely well-received Lootera was a “once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. I felt it was written for me”. People kept telling her not to do the film, that it was meant for a more mature actress, but she figured it was a dream role. And, she admits, the very fact that people were advising her against it goaded her to go for it. While she makes no pretense to high cinema, the 26-year-old girl, who’s taken on masala blockbuster movies head-on and won the heart of the hinterlands, feels that a slow, period romance like Lootera has given her recognition as an actor.

She comes on the set, gets ready with her lines and awaits the director’s instruction. Opening each day with a clean slate, she prefers to be moulded according to the director’s vision, believing that no one understands the character better. In her upcoming release this month, the Akshay Kumar-Imran Khan starrer, Once Upon A Time In Mumbai Dobaara, she plays a girl who makes the move from Kashmir to Mumbai to act. The first Milan Luthria film was a gangster thriller; the sequel has a stronger love angle, requiring a different chemistry for each character (Akshay and Imran), and balancing that became a challenge for her. “I was never a movie buff – I watched very few movies. I like to observe people and their nuances. I meet so many people every day – there is so much variety.”

“Sonakshi is professional, dedicated, fearless and magical. She has a wonderful presence – if she chooses her roles well over the next few years she could be one of the all-time greats.”
– Vikramaditya Motwane, director

Standing tall at five feet and eight inches, she’s comfortable in her own skin, but remains a quiet person. “I am a Gemini – two sides of a coin. I’m a shy person; I like to be by myself sometimes. I don’t overindulge in conversations with people I wouldn’t know.” She knows she’s here to do a certain job and that’s all that matters. “Some people are just meant to do what they are meant to do. I’ve inherited it from my father (actor-politician, Shatrughan Sinha) – he’s a very confident person. Besides, I don’t have anything not to be confident about – I’m very happy, I’m doing well; I’m working hard.” But it’s an industry of insecurities. “That’s what a lot of people tell me. I don’t know. I don’t want to be the centre of attention, I’m not insecure, I’m very comfortable with who I am, with what I’m doing, I don’t poke my nose into other people’s business. I guess that makes me a misfit!”

Sonakshi has her life cleanly compartmentalised. “I switch on and switch off with the camera. I don’t like to take my work home, I don’t like to talk about it; at home it’s a completely different life.”

Preferring to hang out with her school and college friends rather than fraternising with industry people, she says, “Going out for events and promotions, crowds of people yelling and shouting your name – that’s where it ends. At home I’m not a star, I’m my parents’ daughter and my brothers’ sister. If I do something wrong I’m reprimanded for it.” Having lived an unabashedly sheltered life while growing up (not being allowed to go abroad to study or to join her brothers at Kodai International boarding school), she admits, “I still have to be home at 1.30 a.m. when I go out! I have a deadline…it’s always been like that.”

Her mother used to be by her side all the time when Sonakshi had just started her movie career, but now she leaves her to figure things out for herself. “While she knows we are always there for her, workspaces have changed today. She’s grown up now, she understands her limits,” says erstwhile actress, Poonam Sinha who recalls how her daughter has always been sure of herself, quick to take a decision, with no qualms after. “She used to sketch much before she knew she wanted a career in fashion design. She would throw the sheets away, but I used to collect her sketches. Even her foray into films – she entered without any formal training in acting, dance or dialogue delivery. But she was confident from day one. I remember Salman Khan saying to her, ‘Wow, you are a one-take artist!’ She also has a strong gut instinct – she had a feeling about Pakhi (Lootera), that no one but she could play that role. She didn’t think twice.”

Sonakshi has wriggled into a very specific niche in Hindi cinema, quietly making it her own. Somehow, that garners the most queries from viewers who are now accustomed to bare-all-wear-nothing heroines. “It’s ironic that people keep asking me why I keep doing traditional roles as opposed to glamorous ones and no one asks any other Hindi cinema actress why she doesn’t do traditional roles as opposed to glamorous ones! We are talking about India, aren’t we,” she snips back with a smile. Playing a UP girl in Dabangg, a Bihari in Rowdy Rathore, a Punjabi kudi in Son of Sardaar, a Bengali in Lootera and now a Kashmiri girl in Once Upon a Time…she’s been captivated by the places she’s shot in. “I’ve covered most parts of India and found the interiors of the country fascinating. While sitting in the city (Mumbai) we tend to plan vacations abroad, and shooting in these locales has been an eye-opener…they are beautiful! And, I love Mumbai. However much we may crib about the mess and the roads, there’s just something about being home – about this being home,” she says with a broad sweep of her hands, encompassing the rain-tossed waves and palm fronds of Juhu beach outside the windows.

You don’t think she’ll hop off to perform a puja anytime soon, but you do think that she’s been raised to be careful of her screen presence and of her public persona. To be mindful of the way her actions would reflect upon her family. “The world has moved on, children live in a freer world, inspired by the West, but we are a very conventional family. She knew her dos and don’ts. Her father comes from that part of India, is a politician…she’s had to understand her responsibility,” says Poonam Sinha. Sonakshi adds, “There has never been any pressure from their side to do any of it – it’s just the way I have been brought up. I am a certain way, I don’t wear certain kinds of clothes, and we are a conservative family. It’s a part of my value system. My upbringing has everything to do with my rootedness and morals. It’s instinctive. Today wherever I go, when I meet somebody senior, actors or technicians, they give a direct compliment to my parents by saying, ‘I want my daughter to be just like you,’ and they use the words sanskaar a lot.”

“She’s got the swagger and attitude of Salman Khan and Akshay Kumar, and what makes them attractive is what makes her attractive: her inherent confidence and security. She’s simple, straightforward and uncomplicated.”
– Imran Khan, actor and co-star

So she sinks easily into her onscreen traditional avatar. She dons the saris and bindis and smiles beatifically into the camera. She’s mastered the art of holding her face at an angle just right, so that her sharp profile can be seen at its best advantage – she knows she can charm the audience with her warm smile and demure flicker of her eyelashes. And when I relate what her co-star and director have to say about her for this interview, you can’t miss the faint blush creeping up. She’s bashful; she’s smiling, she’s unable to look up. “The overall perception is that the youth is getting immoral – but that is a generalisation. I think India remains a rooted country, a country bound by values. That’s the basic story.”

Out of India

20 Friday Apr 2012

Posted by in Humour, Parenting, Publication: Verve Magazine, Travel Stories

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Published: Verve Magazine, Features, April 2012

It’s best if your kids get trained on home ground to face the intricacies of a splashy European holiday, as you travel in season with the jet setters of the world. But while tossing around the Mediterranean waves, are Indian kids missing out on knowing their own turf, asks Sitanshi Talati-Parikh

It took a leisurely Sunday brunch conversation at Café Zoe, a new Manhattan-style eatery in South Mumbai – exposed brick, metal beams et al – to remind us of what makes an Indian Summer. For those without school-going children, vacations are all about nipping off to the next hotspot all year round. Children tend to make social lives non-existent and travel plans seasonal. In my time, childhood summer vacations expanded into long sunny and muggy days of reading, swimming, learning tennis; the lucky ones travelling to Disney World or coral sighting around the Reef, catching spring on one end and autumn on the other. Now, with the advent of the International Baccalaureate educational system (IB) – prudently adopted by the crème de la crème schools of the country – the concept of a summer vacation (matching the international breaks around June-July) if not travelling abroad, would be incredibly difficult days of watching the rain pelt away and probably kicking around some slimy mush.

No sensible parent would make the mistake of keeping the kids homebound during these difficult months. And so, as a matter of course, summer breaks have changed dramatically to be Riviera cruising or Tuscany villa-bathing. Indians and their little tots are quite in with the European jet set, hopping onto a chartered yacht for a soiree or catching a rave in Ibiza after the kids are snoozing. Not surprisingly, the IB system fits in beautifully with the LV-armed maternistas’ (mothers who are fashionistas or even simply, yummy mummies) idea of a chic vacation. The Far East is suitable for a quick turn during Easter, Europe and its many sophisticated charms make for a cultural rendezvous in the summer break, and Latin America and its mysterious Incas and Brazilian parades fit in quite neatly during Christmas and New Year.

The world is the child’s oyster and you may actually counter: for someone who must surely play a part in global politics of the future in some capacity, is it not important to start the education young? To that effect, it might just be ideal to switch Sunday brunches from chilli cheese dosa to whole-wheat apricot pancakes. From the local Udipi guy to Pali Village Café. Ironically, what we New Age Indians love about these new café hotspots is their intrinsic non-Indianness. You find yourself celebrating the escape from what is India into a safe haven of faux cobblestones, rustic interiors and Latino soundtracks. In any case, it is wise to alter their (the children’s) taste buds to suit the vacation spots, for most ease of use. After all, no self-respecting Burberry mum will allow for her child to demand dal-chawal in Marbella. Popularised by Zoya Akhtar’s 2011 film Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara, children look forward in tangy anticipation to the La Tomatina festival in Bunõl as a wonderful cultural experience to whet an appetite for a freshly stomped meal. It’s not surprising then, that there’s an unnatural buzz in the air about Starbucks finally coming to India this year and Australian coffee house Di Bella making its foray into desi turf. Does one actually expect those little Gucci shoes to prance into a genuinely unpainted local Iranian café when there is an option of a peppermint frappuccino in a Christmas-carol touting, chicly hand-painted coffee shop?

The kids are wonderfully globalised, with curios for their rooms from every part of the world, and possibly a cultural hangover which can be passed off as jet lag. It is unlikely that Mount Abu or Meenakshi fit into the grand scheme of things, unless it’s a part of a school field trip. India is exactly that – a field trip, quite like going to the zoo or bird sanctuary or a museum: to be looked at with wonder, noted for a history or sociology class. You turn away with the first roots of cynicism as you wonder why our monuments can’t be as nicely kept as the ones we see abroad. You come away with a sense of loss and a protective distaste for the sights and smells of the country that will possibly stay with you a lifetime. The same smells that writers of the diaspora sigh about dreamily form a noxious accent to the lives of those who live here. Would we want our children to grow up fondly reminiscing about the urea-scented trips to the Elephanta caves, when they could deliberate on the Mona Lisa’s mystical smile over a Parisian pain au chocolat?

As it turns out, India is merely an option – or more rightly, Indianness is merely an option. It’s like a home menu that reads: Thai Monday, Mexican Tuesday, Italian Wednesday, Indian Thursday and Hibachi grill Friday. It’s not just about the food; it’s about looking at an Indian life. Cosmopolitan India is about rapidly assimilating the lifestyle of the world and making the city more palatable. It is no longer the expats who crave a Chilean sea bass and hop across to their local gourmet restaurant. It is the Indian who craves something regularly non-Indian to make him stay sane in a city that exhausts him with its grey clouds of monotony. If you can’t live abroad, at least the proverbial ‘Chef’ Mohammed can bring ‘abroad’ to your neighbourhood. There may have been a time when Indians just wanted to be cool and try new things. Today, Indians want international flavour with a sense of permanence. Indianness is merely chutney on the Mediterranean focaccia: in turn, layered, dipped into, hidden or wiped away.

Maybe in spirit, a city-dweller is a restless species, an eternal traveller, one who is looking for escape from home before he returns home. Maybe we just need to slow down: the pace of the city – with our always-online work, rapid-fire social connections perpetually drain us, and we need to be recharged often if not sooner. Our children face it from the word ‘Go’ – with their language classes for six-month-olds, baby gyms for nine-month-olds, and birthday parties every alternate day. Maybe it is a genetic illness we are passing along in growing measures down generations – that we can’t quite stop planning the next getaway before the first break has ended. It keeps the adrenalin pumping, keeps up the excitement to land at Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport (or your own desi equivalent) with a spring in your step, just brimming with the knowledge that soon you’ll be back here, taking off to another place of intrigue.

An acquaintance points out that her sister has spent five years in the coolest, hippest, buzziest city in the world – New York, and yet, can’t wait to get away occasionally. So maybe it is less that we tire of India and more that we tire in general. It’s just that when we do get weary, we look far away for solace – wine country, beaches of Croatia…. What’s wrong with a neatly reworked heritage place – think Neemrana – in the nostalgic Matheran of our own childhood to build the memories of our children’s youth? As the desis would say it – though I doubt they would be couture (kosher) – ‘Culture ka culture ho jayega, aur holiday ka holiday.’

MasterChef On My Plate

17 Saturday Dec 2011

Posted by in Humour, Publication: Verve Magazine, Social Chronicles

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Published: Verve Magazine, Social Chronicle, December 2011
(Illustration by Farzana Cooper)

If you are the latest in the line if PYTs to send your hubby a tiffin that contains pan-seared foi gras with a champagne berry jus, then you know you’ve arrived onto a culinary scene that’s flush with promise and ready to launch. Sitanshi Talati-Parikh describes the necessity of taking a kitchen rendezvous to the next step

 

Verve-masterchef

 

‘Do you cook?’ She whispered. ‘Of course not!’ I retorted scornfully.  Great parties are never about knowing what to cook; they are all about finding the right caterer. Gloved hands, butler coats, flitting in and out: the spanking German-designed modular kitchen is meant to be seen, not used. Must you fret whether pesto has pine nuts or pistachios? I’m quite certain it’s the latter, logically, isn’t pesto the green one?

 

Lately though, newbie home-makers carry recipes in their Ferragamo totes, and while sneezing up a bomb at the local Nature’s Basket, can easily tell one nut from another. Blame it on the latest reality TV craze: MasterChef Australia – far superior to its Indian franchise. As the country watches with bated breath which one of the accented Australians go down under and which ones make it to the top, the ladies are picking up a few tricks along the way, and the men are finding a new itch to scratch: the kind which involves a cutting board and a chef’s hat. After all, those men in chef whites skim over the fine line to count as men in uniform – and the way into a woman’s boudoir may well be through her stomach. Many a young man has now leaned over the bar and whispered suggestively into his lady love’s ear, ‘Your kitchen or mine?’

 

Now, you can’t visit a friendly home without getting a sprig of parsley in your Brie, or a dose of balsamic vinaigrette in your chilled watermelon balls. Recipes are snitched from one of the mushrooming gourmet restaurants in the city – the toasted pine nut, goat cheese and watermelon salad is The Tasting Room, I believe – and every meal is judged on the outlandishly clever gourmet competency of the home-maker-turned-chef. Does your beetroot come laced with chevre? Has it been garnished just so? If not, it’s not good enough to be plated up?

 

Play dates (for the uninitiated: the time like-minded infants spend getting to know each other) are also a fine chance to show off those pa(i)ring skills: preparing the finest meal for your child’s little friend – what could be a better sign of love? Ten-month-olds are developing a spectacular taste for the healthy good life – in the form of broccoli-and-spinach risotto garnished with fresh basil, a traditional (low-spice of course) massuman curry and zucchini-and-parmesan ravioli, washed down with a tall bottle of elaichi-flavoured formula milk.

 

And it’s not just the chic young men and women flaunting their culinary skills, it’s about ensuring that you have a system in place to replicate this sensational food – anytime and with the least bother. And to that end, my Bihari cook is now struggling with understanding my desire to replace a Bombay grilled chutney sandwich on Britannia bread with a Mediterranean sandwich on multigrain herb focaccia.  And not even adding his own home-made paneer? Instead, layering the green meat of a tasteless fruit that he imagines to be Bengali baingan together with hefty hunks of feta, grilled zucchini and eggplant licked with a killer harrissa paste! He grudgingly grasps that the need of the hour – and the possibility of survival – means his knowing his parmigiana from his au gratin.

 

Chefs are now finding themselves akin to moviestars: in a recent MasterChef India (Season 2) show, one of the contestants cried because she got to meet her idol Michelin-starred, New York-based, Indian chef Vikas Khanna, whom she then proceeded to serenade. With Indians and Sri Lankans making their token presence felt on international cooking shows stirring up a curry-and-flatbread once in a way, and with Michelin-starred chef Vineet Bhatia attempting to challenge the desi taste buds, it appears innovation is the call of the day. You can’t serve up chana-bhatura any more, but what you can do is throw in chickpea couscous, broccoli khichdi and bhatura-flavoured sorbet. Now that would be a meal worth writing home about.

 

No longer is it about spices – it is about tempering taste buds with the appropriate levels of flavour so that they (your taste buds) can regain their virginity – and discard the massacre of years of generous masalas and chilli powder. And it isn’t really about eating – or stomaching to satisfy – as it is about teasing and cajoling the culinary senses into a pleased stupor. Hunger is for the middle-class. Palate-teasers are what fine dining is all about. It is no wonder that young chefs returning from Manhattan, dipping their fingers into genteel party catering, serve up hors d’oeuvres the size of peanuts. So smoked mozzarella flatbreads are actually coin pizzas, the size of, well, the shiny new 10-rupee coin. Tapas are in, or haven’t you heard? A meal in one of Mumbai’s trendy restaurants can consist of merely ordering 17 tapas and needing a hefty bottle of wine to wash all that tiny, tasty food down to feel deliciously full. 

 

Wine pairing can’t be missed of course. No self-respecting 30-something will serve anything less than the perfect limited-edition international sipper that goes best with the course being served. All along, the conversation tinkles with very profound discussions on Chinese politics, Rushdie’s literary smackdowns, and whether the Riesling would work better with the coconut soufflé or the champagne tart. My ultimate brain wave is to serve up a passion-fruit-and-lemongrass Sangria. It’s the easy way out of pretentious course-drinking – and is somehow that crass, bohemian sort of thing one can do, to remain cool after all that soul-searching food.

 

Talking about soul-searching food, the gourmands believe in cooking from your heart, and with a dollop of love. How much can you cook from your heart, when your stomach is empty and how much love can emanate from that drop of extra virgin olive oil that you mayn’t get from your grandmother’s hand-churned ghee?

 

The thrill lies in the pleasure-seeker and the social climber. After all, can you really be eating khana-khazana-type makhani food in your Jimmy Choos and Herve Leger? It is worth sharing Gouda and Roma tomato notes, if merely to prove that the world is your personal oyster and you have an international, exclusive and very uber chic stew cooking in your state-of-the-art kitchen. And after that dinner party full of whispered conversation, clinking flutes and a sense of social accomplishment, where the senses have been thrilled with that one lactose-free beetroot foam tortellini, you are more than likely to find yourself kicking back furtively with a hearty macaroni baked dish, folded with about 250 grams of Amul cheese, and a little kiss of ketchup.

And one man we love to hate. (Hint: Five Point OMG)

14 Wednesday Dec 2011

Posted by in Musings

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Just watched Love2HateU with the celebrity guest being Chetan Bhagat. I feel rather bad for the hater, the poor girl stood no chance against Bhagat’s generous Gandhi-ism. He was so beatifically patronizing and condescending that I wonder she didn’t throw something at him. But that’s Chetan Bhagat – a huge icon and idol to some and a huge eyebrow raiser to others.

Bhagat’s success – and he is astonishingly successful – is because he has crawled through the cracks and found his target audience. And what a target audience that is. The non-readers. Instead of churning out a high-brow book filled with beautiful metaphors and aiming for the Booker, Bhagat does what he does best – appeal to the section of the readers that is undiscerning. But that’s not to say that his writing has no merit. It’s just unpalatable to a reader who wants something more – an enhanced literary experience, if you must.

Bhagat makes no pretensions about his literary aspirations, but he appears to consider you with pitiful glances if you question his success. He basks in his own stupendous success, often lying on a raft of self-appreciation, and what irks people is that his raft never, ever capsizes. Top models can have a bad hair day, brilliant directors can have a box office flop, the Sensex can crash, but Chetan Bhagat only goes from strength to strength.

His hater questioned the audience and their intelligence. One girl defensively answered, “Ya we read other stuff. But I don’t want to read Rushdie. I’d much rather read Bhagat.” So you have a polarized readership of Indians. The ones who read Rushdie or Amitav Ghosh and the ones who read Bhagat. Bhagat has automatically found his masses, found his safety in numbers and addressed the people who look for easy escapism in reading and not for anything challenging. Bhagat is proud of the fact that he has made people who don’t read, read. Readers are appalled by the fact that these non-readers have begun with reading his books and set their literary standard there. But each to his own, right?

And in a democratic world, readers should have that choice. Readers should have beach novels, glossy magazines, Mills & Boon and Bhagat. It isn’t annoying that Bhagat’s books are valid reading options for people. What’s annoying is how much people like them, and give him a reason to keep going. And it would be far less annoying if he didn’t think so much of himself. “I’m happy to be on this show (Love2HateU) because my new book has just released and I want to know that there are people here who don’t like what I do, not just people who enjoy my books.” Oh stuff it.

iManage iNDIA

08 Friday Apr 2011

Posted by in Musings

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Our democracy has given us the ability to make so many choices – a few decades ago, we chose to leave for better opportunities elsewhere, recently we choose to return because of plum prospects in India. But whenever we have to choose to be alert citizens, we choose the easy road – the road of oblivion, escapism and feigned ignorance. Even worse – something I am guilty of, too – cynicism and haplessness.

When an elderly man decides to fast, we tweet. When scams are exposed, we update our status in horror. When our status quo is breached we respond with anger, criticism even shock, but no solutions.

We, the urban intelligentsia, have found no way out, and have preferred to let the zoo animals that are our bureaucrats and politicians rule roost while we hatch eggs – shaking our intellectual manes over the evils at fine soirées.

We may #tweetforwickets in a strong show of national spirit, we may cry in emotional joy at national wins, but we make no move to change what’s wrong.

It’s true, the answers are often not with us, there needs to be a collective consciousness that decides to take no more sh*t. Everytime there is someone who inspires us, or something that appalls us, we make a stir, think about a rising, and then, in one collective motion, sit our asses right back into our plush la-z-boy recliners.

It’s unfortunate that we have the option to leave, or the money to ignore the crap that goes on in our backyard, or the cynicism to empty every full glass – because the moment we run out of our options, we may be fasting like good man Anna Hazare for our future, as our men steal every morsel from our homes.

Gandhi fasted for independence, its a shame that 60+ years hence, a man has to fast merely to get a bill noticed in parliament. Elle Woods would be charmed. Tsunamis may be hitting the Pacific, but it is the wasteland of Indian inaction that requires attention.

The Unromance of Realism

07 Thursday Apr 2011

Posted by in Musings, Social Chronicles

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With sexting and instant messaging, relationships have become just that – instant and ephemeral. Books and films have emulated these real-life changes with often not-so-interesting results. Has the romance in art – and relationships – died?

What defines society today is words and connections. What separates this generation from the ones before is the power of the spoken word. We think that technology is what has changed us, made us the people that move faster, think faster and behave fast. While that may be true in some part, what has empowered technology has been content – online jargon for words. Thoughts, bubbles, discussions, emoticons, replies, retorts, criticism, feedback, conversations, investigations, observations, retweets, status updates…the list goes on.  This generation has increased communication by communicating less and with fewer words. It faces the task of dealing with information overload while constantly putting out more information. The oxymorons define the mindset of today – a generation that wants everything, wants everything super quick and instantly accessible and doesn’t really have the time or the patience to sift, read, ponder. That is where texts, BlackBerry messages, tweets and status updates are the de facto means of communication. It is rare for anyone to pick up the phone and have a good old-fashioned chat, in the generation that prefers to stick to a far more impersonal, but rapid form of communication. It has its own personal vocabulary: insistent abbreviations – often indecipherable to the uninitiated – and instant communication. You find people with heads bent, eyes darting and fingers moving rapidly in practiced synchronisation: rarely able to maintain eye-contact for more than a couple of minutes, rarely can a conversation run its natural old-fashioned course without interruption, as we move into an era of distracted and continuous communication and therefore, erratic and easily dismissed short-lived relationships.

Popular culture represents the dialogue and relationships of today: faster, more impatient and often meaningless. Younger filmmakers have updated their scripts to emulate real life. While underworld films picked up the nuances of the underbelly through actions and dialogue, romance in the arts has been for the longest time linked to a larger-than-life drama. Case in point: the cinema of Karan Johar or Sooraj Barjaytya. Where they update the clothes and the music, the dialogue often remains over-dramatised and pedantic. While some may argue that romance needs the dramatisation, a striking example to contest the argument is that of Saathiya – where the dialogue is rapid, off-the-street and yet, is a powerful story. There is a strong resonation with the viewer, an easy relatability, which carries the film from run-of-the-mill to sensitive and meaningful. Farhan Akhtar’s Dil Chahta Hai made the trend a popular one, taken up by film-makers like Kunal Kohli (Hum Tum) and Imtiaz Ali (Jab We Met and Love Aaj Kal).

It is the language of frankspeak  or straightspeak. Where once “You complete me” was the sigh-generating dictum, now, “I need a break” is easily said, without much angst, furor or thought. Quick answers, rapid and sometimes thoughtless decisions and a sense of bubbling impatience mark the dialogues that often don’t lead anywhere special. This is the nature of relationships of today and the conversations emulate them. Easily said, easy to bed and quick to leave – all takes place faster than a thought, and what is left are non-events. How does this make and fill the artistic and aesthetic space of a film? While Kohli-directed Hum Tum talks about a meandering relationship, When-Harry-Met-Sally-style, he pumps the story with events – which hold the weight of the relationship between the protagonists that appears to be going nowhere. In an attempt to emulate real life and their easy-come-easy-go relationships, Kohli’s recent production Break Ke Baad, directed by Danish Aslam, is a slick film that lacks a meaty story, full of ‘non-happenings’. Conversations, while witty and fresh, would make a better radio play than a long commercial movie. While this may be a comment on relationships today, the art demands a certain balance between real life and cinematic license – it demands that elements, moments and events become at the very least marginally larger than life, to create entertainment, to be watchable. Ali’s Love Aaj Kal nearly crossed the line to become over-ripe with conversations, in the same quest to describe modern-day relationships. Where LAK teetered dangerously, Jab We Met remained fresh in its cinematic experience, particularly through the crispness of dialogue and emotion.

Deepika Padukone’s character, Aaliya, in Break Ke Baad is not lovable in the traditional sense – much like Sonam Kapoor’s Aisha, she is unintentionally selfish and possibly doesn’t deserve the good guy. The industry buzz has it that Zoya Akhtar’s debut film Luck By Chance missed it’s calling because the protagonist, Vikram, was not a nice guy. We don’t feel empathy for the characters and don’t wish them to reach a happy ending. And that is dangerous ground for a film to enter in the romance genre. And it is also rather disturbing seeing that these characters have been picked from real life. Is it true, then, that we prefer the traditional romantic notion of characters that may be slightly misguided, but are nice? Even if that is not real life? So as dialogues get updated, people shouldn’t?

Two recent books speak a local language, but in entirely different ways. Anuja Chauhan’s Battle For Bittora speaks real politik – the language of local and honest-to-good (sense the irony) politics, seen through the eyes of a girl of this generation. There is amusement, cynicism and wonder. While the romance remains honest to chick lit, and the dialogues are basic, matter-of-fact and emulating real life, it is the clever writing and story that lifts this novel from being mundane to a page-turner. Where Chauhan’s effortless writing excites, first-time writer, Rhea Saran’s Girl Plus One is trying too hard, as are her heroines, to become a desi Sex and the City. Saran is not wrong in suggesting, rather obviously, the fact that Indian girls today are openly emulating Manhattan’s popular TV series; however, Saran misses Candace Bushnell’s witticisms that make all the difference between real life and drama. Would a real-life Carrie really talk in continuous innuendoes? No. She simply finds a correlation between her column and her life.

However art is updated to make it believable and real, it is obvious that the artistic license must be used to lift the dullness of real life to a heightened sense of real-life drama. In creating a believable sense of inclusion in a person’s daily, often mundane life, while bringing art into our homes, drawing rooms and bedrooms, we need to maintain a certain distance that allows us to appreciate the nuances of every character, story and relationship. These elements need to interesting and memorable, and often, real life is not. That doesn’t mean we need to regress and run around trees dancing amid roses, but it does mean that we need to assess the dramatic intent of the medium: does the film justify being larger-than-life? Does the book deserve to be printed and propped up on the ‘New Arrivals’ bookshelf rather than be a basic online blog? All in all, while pointing out the casual and matter-of-fact manner of everyday relationships, are we missing the romance in the written word and the spoken dialogue? And are we losing the romance in relationships?

And that leads me to question – do we want the old-fashioned nature of romance, or does that not matter to us anymore? Does a quick sext or a couriered designer bag charm us more than an old-fashioned hand-written note with a love song? Are we so accustomed to sentimentalising love and romance that we are unable to accept it in its matter-of-fact form anymore? If the written word stands for the way we think, then are we changing so dramatically that we question and often thwart sentimentality in its old-fashioned sense? Do we love, or do we ‘like’? Or are we confused because it is ‘too complicated’?