Natasha Das (b.1984) studied traditional figurative oil painting in Florence, Italy and after several years, frustrated with the limitations it offered her, she began her studies in the art of Aari, with an all-male artisanal group based in Assam. Aari is a traditional form of Indian embroidery that is often used in garment making. With the skills she acquired from painting, and an eye for composition, colour, and perspective, she incorporated thread and textiles into her work.

In her most recent body of work, Das explores the various silks that originate in India, their regional characters, and histories. For example, researching how Eri and Muga silks are harvested and woven and what cultural customs and values are attached to them traditionally impacted her choices and compositions. Muga silk – one of the rarest and finest silks in the world that has fallen out of mainstream circulation for reasons having to do with both British colonization and more recently climate change – for its beautiful gold luster and for its traditional, non-industrialized way of sourcing and creating silk thread. On the other hand, her Eri silk series was inspired by the only non-violent way of sourcing silk fiber from a special moth that must leave the cocoon before the fiber can be harvested.

Beyond uncovering their cultural meaning, Das is interested in the potential of these materials beyond their traditional use. While oil painting and embroidery appear vastly different in terms of creative and societal constructs, gender politics, traditions, and culture, Das has found a way to link these disparate practices in unique ways. Her hybrid canvases are painted and embroidered but also deliberately de-stretched and frayed, resulting in irregular textures, and often revealing the stretching frame itself – alluding to a more conceptual approach. In some of her most recent works the painting disappears and the embroidered threads take over the picture plane providing a lavish abstraction. 

Natasha Das studied painting in Florence, Italy, and New York. Her work has been exhibited at the Hudson Valley Museum of Contemporary Art, the Hunterdon Art Museum and the Gross McLeaf Gallery in Philadelphia. Her work is included in numerous private collections in the US, Europe, and Asia, as well as in public collections such as the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and the Kiran Nadar Museum of Art in Delhi, India.