Shahid Ansari, owner of Ahmedabad-based Hunar Art & Craft, holds up his recent creation—a zardosi piece depicting the endangered Great Indian Bustard. “I have moved out of my comfort zone of architectural motifs to create pieces that depict wildlife,” says the 48-year-old as he picks up the needle to work on another vibrant piece with the Asiatic lion in the centre. Ansari is prepping for the upcoming exhibition at the Vibrant Gujarat Global Investors Summit in Gandhinagar in January 2024. Besides working on images of animals on the brink of extinction, he is also creating embroidered pieces of monuments from different parts of India.
The Ahmedabad resident was in the tenth grade when a friend introduced him to zardosi master artisan Amino Ustad. “I began my training under him in 1992,” says Ansari, who dropped out of school to work as a karigar with handicraft factories. Once he was confident about his skills, he branched out as an independent artisan working with local designers, boutique owners and garment firms. “Unfortunately, the good times did not last. Digital embroidery began to take away business from my workshop. It became difficult to make ends meet,” he says.
But tough times don’t last, tough people do. Ansari’s career got a second innings when architect and activist Debasish Nayak, who was working on heritage conservation for the Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation, invited him to exhibit his works in 2009. “It was an eye-opener. I began to think about how I could capture the architectural heritage of the city using embroidery,” he recalls, adding, “I began to spend time in the walled city with its ornate chhajjas, arches, balconies, brackets and columns, wondering how I could recreate them on cloth. My first piece showcased Ahmedabad’s chabutras, the exquisitely carved bird-feeding structures in the residential quarters called pols. Another large piece, which depicted the Teen Darwaja—the triple archway of Ahmedabad— took over six months to finish.”
At a 2014 exhibition in Ahmedabad, all his 29 pieces were sold, prompting him to innovate further. He created souvenirs with Mahatma Gandhi as the theme. “On a visit to the Gandhi Ashram, I was fascinated to see replicas of the Mahatma’s signature in different languages. I embroidered these on khadi. It became one of my best-selling items,” he says. In 2017, when Ahmedabad won the UNESCO tag of World Heritage City, it gave him further impetus. “The same year, I got the opportunity to travel to Spain to exhibit my works,” he smiles.
In October this year, Ansari came up with a new series depicting the Indo-Islamic architecture of Ahmedabad. “I am also working on the Tree of Life theme, a symbol of learning and wisdom in Islamic art,” he says, as he picks up a delicately embroidered piece depicting the jaali work at the 16th-century Sidi Saiyyed Mosque. In the master craftsman’s hands, derivatives are reviving heritage.