15 November, 2026
02:00 PM - 03:00 PM
Aditya Birla Auditorium | On-site
What meaning and collective memory do materials carry? Paper, pigment, cowrie shells, gold leaf, thread and cloth are not neutral carriers of meaning. They shape the significance and relevance of an artwork.
Painter Jayasri Burman, uses watercolour, ink, shells and gold leaf to retell myth and folk memory. Karishma Swali of Chanakya School of Craft makes collaborative artworks, pairing artists with skilled artisans so that hand-embroidery carries an artist’s vision. Designer Sandeep Khosla of Abu Jani Sandeep Khosla, elevated chikankari and zardozi to couture.
Moderated by art writer and curator Kishore Singh, the conversation will ask, who is the artist when many hands make a work? Where does craft end and art begin? And how do fragility and handwork shape the way we value what is made?
The ART MUMBAI Speaker Series is presented by the Kiran Nadar Museum of Art
'Krishnakali' by Jayasri Burman. Image courtesy Jayasri Burman and Chawla Art Gallery
Jayasri Burman is one of India’s leading contemporary artists, celebrated for her visual language that brings together mythology, folklore, nature and the feminine imagination. Trained at Kala Bhavana, Santiniketan, and the École des Beaux-Arts, Paris, she creates paintings and sculptures inhabited by goddesses, women and fantastical beings. Her work draws from the cultural memory of Bengal while exploring universal themes of love, strength, peace, harmony, spirituality and transformation. With Mukti, she continues to explore freedom, and our relationship with the natural world, while Amlaan, her debut jewellery collection, extends her vocabulary into an intimate, wearable form.
Karishma Swali is the Creative Director of Chanakya International and the Chanakya School of Craft, and Founder and Chair of the Chanakya Foundation. She is an artist whose interdisciplinary practice, developed with Chanakya School, brings the material and textile traditions of the Indian subcontinent into dialogue with free inquiry and expression. Her three-decade engagement with fashion draws from the textile histories and material cultures of the subcontinent, continually exploring their contemporary possibilities. Through the Chanakya School of Craft, her educational practice advances women’s creative autonomy and knowledge transmission. Working with master artisans and graduated women artists, her artistic practice has been presented at La Biennale di Venezia, the Vatican Apostolic Library, Musée Rodin, Art Basel and Frieze.
Sandeep Khosla was born in 1963 in Kapurthala, Punjab - a former Sikh princely state. He went to Doon boarding school with his sister. Like Abu, Sandeep was always drawn to art and design, which he explored throughout his growing years. A trip to Mumbai in 1986 led to a serendipitous encounter with Abu Jani. This became the founding moment of their eponymous label. Sandeep was and remains an optimistic, ambitious individual. He has a penchant for honouring the grandiosity of his ideas instead of letting others tone them down. Alongside Abu Jani, he has created a couture house that has successfully revived, restored and reinvented Indian embroidery traditions like never before. Today, he and Abu Jani continue to head the house of Abu Jani Sandeep Khosla, which celebrated 40 Years on 15th August, 2026.
Kishore Singh is an independent author, editor and curator whose recent projects include the centenary retrospective on Satish Gujral at NGMA New Delhi in January-April this year, Kanchan Chander’s retrospective of prints and drawings, and A Moment in the Monumental group show at Bikaner House, both in September 2026. Mapin published his Portrait of an Artist with photographer Rohit Chawla this April. As speaker, panelist, trainer and moderator, he appears frequently on art-related and other platforms. He was previously with DAG as head of exhibitions and publications, with Business Standard as a senior editor, has co-edited and published books with FICCI, and written books on art, travel, history and business. He has been instrumental in launching several media products and was chief editor at Roli Books. He has scripted documentary films.
