Bauhaus, Santiniketan and modern design education in India
In the epistemic context of a fundamental skepticism towards the existing knowledge system, the Bauhaus school was in pursuit of “unlearning”: dismissing conventional learning and promoting pre-linguistic, intuitive approaches - which also led to adoptions of non-academic modes of perception and included an interest in pre-modern knowledge systems. As schools that heralded a new era the Bauhaus and the world universities shared a drive for educational reform that from the early 20th century grew worldwide from an across-the-board criticism of civilization and culture. The discussion will focus on the sharing outlook of both worlds in pursuit of a ‘modern’ world university.
A moderated-conversation between Suchitra Balasubrahmanyan, Anshuman Dasgupta and Regina Bittner.
This programme is open to all and will be live-streamed on the official Facebook pages of Goethe-Institut Kolkata and Indian Museum.
Speakers:
© Regina Bittner
Regina Bittner is a cultural anthropologist and curator. She has studied cultural theory and art history at Leipzig University and received her doctorate from the Institute for European Ethnology at the Humboldt Universität Berlin. As head of the Academy of the Bauhaus Dessau Foundation she curates and teaches the postgraduate and cross disciplinary programmes on transcultural modernism in design and architecture research. She has been the Deputy Director of the Bauhaus Dessau Foundation since 2009.Her most recent curatorial project include Versuchsstätte Bauhaus. The collection, the permanent exhibition in the Bauhaus Museum Dessau. Her research interests combine cultural anthropological approaches in architecture and design studies with questions of decolonisation, critical heritage and its mediation in teaching and curatorial practice. Her most recent curatorial and publication projects include Design Rehearsal. Conversations about Bauhaus Lesson together with Katja Klaus (2019), Craft becomes modern. The Bauhaus in the making (in collaboration with Renee Padt 2017), In Reserve. The Household! Historic Models and Contemporary Positions from the Bauhaus (in collaboration with Elke Krasny) and The Bauhaus in Calcutta. An Encounter of the Cosmopolitan Avant-garde (in collaboration with Kathrin Rhomberg, 2013).
Suchitra Balasubrahmanyan
Suchitra Balasubrahmanyan teaches at the School of Design, Ambedkar University Delhi. Her research interests centre on the intersections between craft, design and nationalism in India against the backdrop of decolonization and Cold War diplomacy. Her publications include “Moving away from Bauhaus and Ulm” (bauhaus imaginista online journal 2019); “Craft and Design in the Hindu Way of Life” in Encyclopaedia of Asian Design Vol. 4: Transnational and Global Issues in Asian Design (Bloomsbury Academic, 2018); “Imagining the Indian Nation: The Design of Gandhi’s Dandi March and Nehru’s Republic Day Parade” in Designing Worlds: National Design Histories in an Age of Globalization (Berghahn 2016).
© bauhaus imaginista
Anshuman Dasgupta has acquired his PhD from Goldsmiths , London University ,Visual Cultures Department, 2017, did his graduation in Art History from Kala Bhavan , Visva Bharati University, Santiniketan, and post-graduation in Art History from the Faculty of Fine Arts, M.S University of Baroda in 1990 and 1992, film appreciation course FTII, Pune in1993 , a research fellow at the MSU, Baroda from 1992 to 1997, he Joined Santiniketan In 1997 (Visva Bharati University), as a lecturer in art History. His recent curatorial ventures include the Ramkinkar Baij Centenary exhibition, Santiniketan, and the Khoj international artists’ workshop exhibition, where he was the curator-critic and the Co – Curator of ‘Santhal Family : Positions around an Indian sculpture’. He chief official curatorial researcher from India for the Bauhaus Imaginista exhibition. As a writer Anshuman has contributed many essays to journals like Lalit Kala Contemporary, The Marg volumes, Nandan- published by the Department of Art History, Kala Bhavan, Visva Bharati University and more recently in the book titled Santhal Family: Positions around an Indian Sculpture, and in Bauhaus Imaginista online/offline journal.
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