Artist-in-Residence
Siddhartha Das
Siddhartha Das is a Delhi-based cultural professional who works through art and design. As a designer Das often strategizes and implements projects by forming networks of professionals that he leads or becomes a part of. His work focuses mainly on cultural, heritage and public spaces and on branding and publications. Das has a strong interest in developmental issues addressed through design and works with various traditional craft communities across India. His aim as an entrepreneur is to create a link between traditional craft communities and urban markets, in India and abroad, through modern design and a business model that provides sustainable livelihood.
He is an Asia Society, Charles Wallace and Nehru Trust Fellow and has received various international fellowships for study tours to Japan, France, Poland and Scotland. Siddhartha was awarded the British Council’s International Young Design Entrepreneur in 2009 and Indian Young Design Entrepreneur in 2008.
In 2002, he founded the multi-disciplinary Siddhartha Das Studio that works on responsible design and cultural spaces across the world. They lead or collaborate on different aspects of strategy, curation and design for cultural institutions, museum complexes, thematic exhibitions; art projects and installations; and livelihood programmes rooted in crafts communities. They offer a wide variety of in-house design expertise and their team includes architects, industrial and graphic designers, art historians and cultural professionals.
Some of the Studio’s projects include the award-winning curation and design of the 80year-old Sardar Govt. Museum, Jodhpur; the interiors for the historic Jal Mahal, Jaipur, and flagship stores for GVK’s Airports in Bangalore and Mumbai; exhibitions at IGNCA and the Crafts Museum, Delhi and has designed the Indian Institute of Art and Design campus, New Delhi. He is the Vice-Chairman of the JD Centre of Art and has organised its Film Festivals on Art and Artists, among other art activities. Das has designed various books, scenography for plays and credit titles in films. He has worked with over 2,500 craftspeople in 15 states of India.
Das has extensively worked in Europe and other parts of the world. He has been part of art residencies in Canada and Japan. He is the Vice-Chairman of the JD Centre of Art, Bhubaneswar and has overseen all its work across disciplines from construction, interiors, programming to conservation. He has also organised the International Film Festivals on Art and Artists, among other art programmes. A featured speaker in India and around the world, he is a visiting faculty at various institutions including Centre for Environmental Planning and Technology (CEPT) and the National Institute of Design (NID), Ahmedabad; Central Saint Martins, London and Willem de Kooning Academie (WdKA), Rotterdam. He has been a contributor to the Arts Illustrated magazine for three years until recently.