More than fabric

KOCHI: The pandemic has sent most of our anxiety levels up. Malappuram-native Naushin Kaipally found inner peace in her long-lost hobby, hand embroidery. Being a graduate in textile design from NIFT Kannur, she took embroidery to a different level by creating designs that display women-centric topics as resistance to patriarchy. Her out-of-the-box subjects even gave life to Sonogram embroidery, inspired by the sonographic visual of her friend’s unborn baby.

She also brings body positivity into the equation. “I started it as a therapeutic activity for my mind. I use it to speak my mind. I narrate incidents and instances that women in the country had to go through at least once — patriarchy, the taboo around menstruation, body shaming or character assassination. I am glad people can relate with it,” says Naushin.

Apart from the socially relevant subjects, Naushin also experiments on mediums like a paper leaf and even twigs. “A little into specialising in fabric embroidery, I thought why limit myself to that. When I saw dry leaves of a jackfruit tree piled in my house’s backyard, I thought it looked strong enough to hold embroidery threads.

Later, I tried combining twigs with embroidery and it came out beautifully. I named the series ‘grow unapologetically’, to convey that we can grow old like the dry leaves and twigs. No matter what your past is, and how withered or tired you are, there could still be beauty and a cathartic rebirth awaiting you,” she says.

According to Naushin, knitting embroidery on leaves was a hard job but it inculcated plenty of patience in her. “The leaves tend to break pretty fast, but it was interesting for me to be consistent and patient with it. I am working on the series ‘Serendipity’ next. It comprises embroidery on paper inspired by sunrise and sunset, nature and earth. I will try to do embroidery on more unusual mediums including wood for my upcoming series,” she adds.

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