A person whose Wide vistas of accomplishments straddle creative writing, textile art, graphics, advertising, photography, exhibition design and the teaching with a desire to pass on all that he knows. Subrata Bhowmick, who time and again has proved his detractors wrong, circumventing the impossible and converting it into a gamut of art. Through all of this however to me he has been friend, advisor, mentor and above all Bhowmick kaka. Four decades of being actively enmeshed in Ahmedabad’s creative explosion, interacting, working, communicating and arguing with some of the equally enigmatic personalities that have made Ahmedabad, the design hub of India.
Ahmedabad in the 60s with its concentration of multi disciplinary interaction was a young Subrata’s training ground. And since then there has been no looking back. As he says, “there are two kinds of people, those that become attached to a city and give selflessly to increase its magnificence and those who attack the city and leech it and decimate its ability to grow.” Subrata Bhowmick is in love with this city which adopted him and using his multifarious talents, has ensured that Ahmedabad occupies center stage and its importance and its importance as a cultural core flowers. Fascinated by the stark power of black lines and the contrasting white spaces in between has always been Subrata’s domain of exploration verging into the grays of black and white imagery. At one time or the other he has been associated with all the variety of institutions that link Ahmedabad’s creative field together. Beginning as part of the pioneering team at Calico to one of the earliest students at an experimental NID, to now being Creative Director of Mudra Communications, it has been a fruitfully romantic journey for Bhowmick Kaka.
His earliest memories take him back a scion of a traditional Bengali family involved in the jute business in Dhaka, present day Bangladesh. As a child he remembers being carried on the back of a family retainer through the jute plantations. The upheavals of partition caused the family to migrate to Howrah, where his father began a retail textile business. This was his first exposure to textiles. His education at this time was handled by his mother at home until a fateful day when he followed some neighborhood children down the main street and discovered the existence of a school. And ecstatic Subrata ran back home and convinced his parents to enroll him there immediately. Even as a child he loved to sketch and paint which was frowned upon by his father and so with encouragement from his mother he used to hide his work under his bed while creatively exploring the power of the line and color on paper. This fascination drew him to utilize his drawing skills to illustrate the most mundane of subject at school. His school test papers must have made exotic reading as they consisted of drawings, maps, and illustrations more than the written words.
An adventure on the ferry across to Kolkata from Howrah, led him to discover Art College. During this juncture at his life, except for his fathers retail business the rest of the family were all civil and construction engineers. Bridges, dams, roads, buildings and architectural drawings was considered the respectable future to strive for. However young Subrata was adamant, he wanted to join Arts School. Though being a student of science, he not only secured admission but also got a scholarship which with the help of friends and well wishers made him acquire ‘precious’ paints and paper. His natural inclination towards graphics, led him in the direction of applied arts.
The twists and turns of life are unpredictably strange by far, a causal glance at an advert looking for designers at the Calico Mills in Ahmedabad made him apply and land up for the interview. Holding on to his portfolio and waiting his turn he almost lost his confidence as there were far more senior aspirants waiting for the same job. But fate had other things in store as the city of Ahmedabad beckoned and Subrata Bhowmick found himself part of the core design team of Calico Textile Mills. Calico mills under the Sarabhais at that time were creating ripples of revolutionary design innovation in the field of Indian textiles. Tremendous freedom and space was given to the designers to explore their creative ability to the fullest. This was also the time that Ahmedabad as a city was at its creative best. With cutting edge intermingling of talent, ideas, and an amalgamation of activities which made Ahmedabad the most culturally vibrant city anywhere. Ahmedabad, in the 60s and 70s was a fascinating city to be a part of. Modern architecture and design were flowing side by side along with a respect and understanding of traditional arts and craft forms. The classic monochrome photograph of pachedis spread out to dry on the banks of the Sabarmati by Courtier Bresson would be the ideal symbolic image of the symbiotic synthesis between the old and new.
It was Giraben who sent the young designer Subroto Bhowmick to the National Institute of Design…. To be continued…..
Published : Ahmedabad Mirror
Showing posts with label Subroto Bhowmick. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Subroto Bhowmick. Show all posts
June 18, 2008
June 11, 2008
Subroto Bhowmick
It was Giraben who sent the young designer Subrata Bhowmick to the National Institute of Design to experiment, to learn and to grow. An interesting byproduct of this was his learning to ride a cycle which in those days cast exactly ‘four naya paisa’ rental per day. The kerosene run light bulb on the cycle was much more expensive to rent than the cycle itself, but that piece of equipment was compulsory to use as an accessory in those seemingly more traffic conscious days.
Gautam Sarabhai along with Giraben ran both the textile mill with its various departments situated as far away as Bapunagar to the Nation Design Institute. Gautambhai Sarabhai was quite adamant in the fact that no one should work after six in the evening. Subrata Bhowmick, in spite of numerous arguments was workohically different. His typical day began in the wee hours of morning, imbibing the machine made art of printed textiles at the mill, then onwards across the bridge to the Design Insitute. Experiments at play, exposed brick walls sculpted around the greens of trees, polished pebbles underfoot, glass, leather, chrome and proverbial rubber plant, inter-connected, multidisciplinary NID.
And then before one knew it, numerous cup of tea and a variety of discussions later, it was already evening and time to return back to the klaxon call of the Calico Mill to work on till late. With due apologies to the Beatles, ‘so little time and so much to do’.
It was the textile industry that ran and defined the city of Ahmedabad, the trade and commerce of this city was inextricably woven within the fabric of this tapestry of mills. Its skyline dotted by an array of brick chimneys, individually embellished with design motifs to give them their distinctive identity. The musical notations of sirens, a familiar sound by which the circle of time was measured. Hand block printed fabric using natural dyes, drying on the river bank with industrial structures mass producing printed textiles looming over them, each complementing the other in the aura generated by their own space. The Calico mill compound and the National Institute of Design spilt across the banks of the flowing Sabarmati, it waters seeped in the woven living history. Delicate machinery resembling human fingers creating floral, geometric patterns on flowingly undulating fabric while elsewhere a master craftsman using hand carved blocks explores the bounty of nature on a textile canvas. In this city of connected contrasts, both are urban art forms, having utility, value and above all beauty. It was industrial wealth which nurtured the traditional craft and they in turn served as repositories of creative knowledge, a symbolic intertwining thread of a unique cultural heritage, a living testimony of an industrial revolution celebrating the cultural traditions mirrored in architectural hegemony of the warp and weft of the city. Rabindra Sangeet. Sunday mornings were reserved for Prakash Cinema where Bengali films were screened and the rest of the day was spent on exploring, sketching and learning the intricate maze of the multi-culturally cohesive city.
Cycling through the sinewy lanes of the old city, catch a screening of ‘Cat Ballou’ at the English Theatre, topped off with an evening spent eating at the Manek Chowk was the proverbial icing on the cake.
These are some of the nostalgic meanderings of Subrata Bhowmick as he leans back at the settee at his Bhowmically Mondrianisque-Miro home interior, the walls punctuated with tapestries of his own creation, complementally showing space with traditional urban folk formulations.
Published: Ahmedabad Mirror
Gautam Sarabhai along with Giraben ran both the textile mill with its various departments situated as far away as Bapunagar to the Nation Design Institute. Gautambhai Sarabhai was quite adamant in the fact that no one should work after six in the evening. Subrata Bhowmick, in spite of numerous arguments was workohically different. His typical day began in the wee hours of morning, imbibing the machine made art of printed textiles at the mill, then onwards across the bridge to the Design Insitute. Experiments at play, exposed brick walls sculpted around the greens of trees, polished pebbles underfoot, glass, leather, chrome and proverbial rubber plant, inter-connected, multidisciplinary NID.
And then before one knew it, numerous cup of tea and a variety of discussions later, it was already evening and time to return back to the klaxon call of the Calico Mill to work on till late. With due apologies to the Beatles, ‘so little time and so much to do’.
It was the textile industry that ran and defined the city of Ahmedabad, the trade and commerce of this city was inextricably woven within the fabric of this tapestry of mills. Its skyline dotted by an array of brick chimneys, individually embellished with design motifs to give them their distinctive identity. The musical notations of sirens, a familiar sound by which the circle of time was measured. Hand block printed fabric using natural dyes, drying on the river bank with industrial structures mass producing printed textiles looming over them, each complementing the other in the aura generated by their own space. The Calico mill compound and the National Institute of Design spilt across the banks of the flowing Sabarmati, it waters seeped in the woven living history. Delicate machinery resembling human fingers creating floral, geometric patterns on flowingly undulating fabric while elsewhere a master craftsman using hand carved blocks explores the bounty of nature on a textile canvas. In this city of connected contrasts, both are urban art forms, having utility, value and above all beauty. It was industrial wealth which nurtured the traditional craft and they in turn served as repositories of creative knowledge, a symbolic intertwining thread of a unique cultural heritage, a living testimony of an industrial revolution celebrating the cultural traditions mirrored in architectural hegemony of the warp and weft of the city. Rabindra Sangeet. Sunday mornings were reserved for Prakash Cinema where Bengali films were screened and the rest of the day was spent on exploring, sketching and learning the intricate maze of the multi-culturally cohesive city.
Cycling through the sinewy lanes of the old city, catch a screening of ‘Cat Ballou’ at the English Theatre, topped off with an evening spent eating at the Manek Chowk was the proverbial icing on the cake.
These are some of the nostalgic meanderings of Subrata Bhowmick as he leans back at the settee at his Bhowmically Mondrianisque-Miro home interior, the walls punctuated with tapestries of his own creation, complementally showing space with traditional urban folk formulations.
Published: Ahmedabad Mirror
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