This Ground, Plus: Khotachi Wadi in Design Context

This design-led exhibition focuses on the history of Khotachi Wadi, located in south Mumbai’s Girgaum, through disciplines as diverse as architecture, culinary histories, speculative art, early street photography and product design. In keeping with the mandate of C&L Design exhibitions, a wealth of archival material has been brought into conversation with contemporary design objects.

Curated by academic and local resident André Baptista, along with Chatterjee & Lal, the exhibition brings together the voices and stories of generations of residents at a moment of unique importance to the area. The distinctiveness of Khotachi Wadi is threatened by the erasure of its 19th and early 20th century bungalows and chawls. These structures – and the worlds created in and around them – have offered unique design solutions for centuries.

Khotachi Wadi is a heritage precinct where built structures and cultural elements trace their antiquity to the early 19th century. Girgaum, as an early historical village, would have been filled with orchards and groves – memories preserved in the names of streets, by-lanes, and wadis. As part of the city’s expansion, East Indian Christians, who originally inhabited the Islands of Bombay and surrounding areas, moved into the locality establishing an enclave complete with distinctive bungalows derivative of Portuguese Colonial Architecture mixed with regional sensibilities.

About the curators:

André Baptista is a lecturer and consultant in Ancient Indian History, Culture & Archaeology. His research interests include prehistory, man-land relationships, landscape evolution on the one hand and colonial history, urban development and shaping of socio-cultural spaces on the other. He has a doctorate in Landscape and Environmental Archaeology from the Deccan College Postgraduate and Research Institute, Pune, India. André has represented Universities as well as the Archaeological Survey of India at a number of explorations and excavations at sites ranging from the prehistoric to the early medieval.

He is Visiting Faculty for Archaeology at the Kamla Raheja Vidynidhi Institute of Architecture and Environmental Studies (KRVIA), Juhu. In November 2017 he was appointed Assistant Editor of Man and Environment, the biannual journal of the Indian Society for Prehistoric and Quaternary Studies (ISPQS), Pune. He has co-edited the 2017 felicitation volume ‘Rethinking the Past: A Tribute to Prof. V.N. Misra’ published by ISPQS. He was a consultant, and a contributing author of the subsection on “Heritage” for Spenta Multimedia’s “The Endless City: Mumbai”, a book by the District Planning Committee, Collector Office, Mumbai Suburban District. His forthcoming edited volume “Adaptations Across Antiquity: Tracing Quaternary Environments and Prehistoric Cultural Responses” is currently in press. Most recently, he served as a Research Consultant for the Maritime History Society, Western Naval Command.

C&L Design is engaged with design histories and, through these histories, with contemporary design. As part of Chatterjee & Lal, it draws on a two decade long exhibition history that has often focussed on the intersection of art and design.