of South Asian art Stella Kramrisch during her time in Kolkata in the first half of the twentieth century. It came with her to America, where it graced her homes prior to its current residence in the Philadelphia Museum of Art (fig. I.15).
Although both kantha have embroidered inscriptions, neither includes a date. Manadasundari’s kantha displays carefully delineated motifs such as the official imagery on colonial-period coins and stamp paper as well as jewelry, and architectural elements that together allow us to locate it in the middle decades of the nineteenth century, as discussed further in chapter 2. Kamala’s kantha, despite its very different subject matter, reveals some fundamental compositional similarities to that of Manadasundari that suggest it was likely also created during this time. A comparison of the elaborate lotuses centering the embroidered surface of each kantha discloses that these floral forms were similarly conceptualized and executed. They indicate that the two textiles belong in a corpus of early kantha that share these elements (figs. I.29, I.30, I.31, 3.7). The lotus on each kantha consists of two overlapping rings of petals around the seedpod at the center. The inner row is comprised of smaller petals, and every two are framed by one larger outer petal. The petals, moreover, share a similar silhouette, one that is distinct from petal profiles on other dated kantha from the second half of the nineteenth century that are more angular and geometric for example, imparting a star-like shape to the flower.103 Each petal on Kamala’s kantha, and each of the outer row of petals on Manadasundari’s kantha, consists of three zones of color, contained within a bold, dark outline rendered in backstitch. Where the tips taper to a point, densely packed red stitches creates a rosy hue, which has since faded and lightened on Kamala’s kantha. The two textiles share the same approach to filling this triangular shape in backstitch, moving in concentric lines along the outer periphery of the three sides toward the center.104 The innermost section of each petal is white, rendered by the absence of embroidery stitches on Kamala’s kantha, while filled with small running stitches on Manadasundari’s. Striations composed of delicate lines of red backstitch create an intermediary zone from the red tip to white base of each petal. Beyond the outer row of petals, three rows of patterns bridge the distance to the paisleys at the periphery of the central medallion. In addition, the paisleys are also comprised similarly on the two kantha (compare figures I.32 and 3.7). Both alternate contrasting colors of threads for filling and outlining each paisley. Further, each leaf-like shape inside the paisley is embroidered in backstitch from periphery to center as in the case of the petal tips. On Manadasundari’s kantha, each paisley is supported on three prongs and filled with a stem with pairs of leaves. Kamala’s kantha elaborates on this base. These fundamental similarities, despite the divergences in each woman’s interpretation visible in the distinctive qualities of her stitchwork, indicate the likelihood that the textiles shared in the conventions circulating among Bengali embroiderers in the middle decades of the nineteenth century in the Khulna-Jessore-Faridpur area, today’s Khulna Division in southern Bangladesh.105
The two kantha also share in the practice of elegantly composed and rendered inscriptions, in marked distinction to others that do not carry any text or that bear only brief signatures stitched by original makers or added later (figs. I.32, 2.1, 3.1).106 These texts give us the name of a primary maker, even though the work must have involved some collaboration because aspects such as layering the base cloth smoothly requires more than a single set of hands, as discussed further in chapter 1. The inscriptions also hint at the conditions of making the textile. Manadasundari seems to have adhered to a common practice of making a kantha with a person or occasion in mind, although these highly malleable and mobile objects can reveal complicated perceptions of ownership and histories of use in the long run. Kamala, on the other hand, does not disclose any singular recipient or event; rather, she meditates on her relationship with her god, allowing us to locate her work in a devotional milieu of deep historical significance in the region.
These textiles have received the most scholarly scrutiny afforded to individual works of this genre, scant as that may be. The iconography of women’s work was typically not given the attention that was lavished on painting, sculpture, or architecture, the genres identified as art. Instead, embroidery, relegated to craft, was addressed predominantly in terms of style and technique. Only a rare handful of textiles, such as the Bayeux Tapestry or sumptuous Byzantine attire, have been so indulged, but the recent spurt of textile scholarship encourages such work beyond Europe. The technical dexterity and creativity displayed on these kantha make them worthy of the kind of careful visual scrutiny that characterizes art historical practice. I take the direction from their inscriptions to interpret the exquisitely detailed imagery, while recognizing that such an approach inevitably has its own problems, reifying the traditional hierarchies associated with medium rather than dismantling them.
I use the textiles to ask how far these objects can give us access to their makers, Manadasundari and Kamala, and to the particular conditions of their making and possibilities of use. Manadasundari and Kamala were like most women who stitched kantha at home, typically for use in extended household networks; if they were literate and therefore the composers of their embroidered inscriptions, they probably did not create substantial written texts, or what they did write—perhaps letters or domestic ledgers—was not deemed significant enough to save. Nor do the material worlds that these needleworkers inhabited endure to give us clues to reconstruct the worlds of their activity. Little is known of the household spaces where they worked and lived, their needles, scissors, and the boxes or containers in which they stored their tools. Yet such absences only reiterate the importance of their finished work as historical documents, as elusive conduits to their mostly unrecorded lives and aspirations.
I.29. Line drawing, central lotus medallion of Mana-sundari’s kantha (figure I.14). Prashanta Bhat, The Landscape Company.
I.30. Line drawing, central lotus medallion of Kamala’s kantha (figure I.15). Prashanta Bhat, The Landscape Company.
I.31 Central lotus blossom. Detail of Manadasundari’s kantha (figure I.14). Gurusaday Museum, Kolkata (GM 1481). Photograph courtesy of Shubhodeep Chanda.
I.32 Paisleys (kalka) around central lotus. Detail of Manadasundari’s kantha (figure I.14). Gurusaday Museum, Kolkata (GM 1481). Photograph courtesy of Shubhodeep Chanda.
This concern also takes on particular significance if we recall that these stitched accounts come from about the time when other Bengali women were writing the earliest memoirs and autobiographical accounts that survive. Juxtaposing the textiles with these texts nuances the range of women’s expressions to insert their voices into the historical record. However, the difficulties of trying to listen for such voices of women from bygone days are many. For one, a generation of scholars has cautioned us to heed the domination of the subaltern studies project in their brilliant attempts to recover
