Shivan & Narresh’s RTW 2024 collection titled ‘Hilma Series’ is bold, bright and beautiful. Inspired by the aesthetics of Swedish artist Hilma af Klint, the range is one of happy vibes, daydream-y and feel-good. A t2 chat with Narresh Kukreja.
How have you interpreted Hilma af Klint’s artwork in the collection?
The whole show is inspired by her paintings. We have taken some of Hilma’s iconic paintings as inspiration to come up with five prints this season — Primordi, Younail, Florain, Springlie and Mysterique. This is one incredible artist who left 1,200-1,500+ paintings as her body of work. It’s so rich in terms of what she has left as a contribution to this world.
How did you discover her work?
We discovered her work when we went to London last year, when we visited the Tate Modern. It was her massive solo exhibition that was going on. Her life-size canvases, just the sheer scale, and how happy the works were, the vibrancy of colour attracted me. When I started researching her, I was inspired to pick her up as an inspiration. When we started to scratch under the skin as to who she was and what her life was, it just blew us away.
She is the first true contemporary artist in the world. In current art history, we are always taught that (Wassily) Kandinsky was the first artist who started abstract art and broke away from the whole landscape and portraits, but Hilma’s works actually predate Kandinsky’s works by four years. It was a huge discovery for the art world... there is so much socio-politics and gender politics.
What’s even more incredible is that she didn’t want her works to be discovered even 20 years after her death because she felt that the world wasn’t ready to see her work because she was so ahead of her times. She never considered herself as an artist. She believed in something called the higher power and which in this case meant God. She would blindfold herself and just hold the canvas and follow the instructions given to her by the higher powers. So most of her paintings, she would say, were the maps of the universe. She felt the world would never understand this language for many decades after her death.
The whole presentation is an ode to her life. We’ve shown her paintings during the show. The reason we unveiled the prints during the show was because all her canvases were hidden from the world.
The paintings are a seamless match with the brand aesthetics. Did that take you by surprise?
Yes! When I saw her paintings, I was so drawn in. I was really blown away that it was so in sync with what we love and what attracts us. When you read about her life, you get to know that her life hasn’t been a joyous one. The paintings are so full of life and a celebration of colour. This duality was inspiring. That took us on a creative journey for the last four-five months.
How many looks did you showcase? We love the shell tops!
There were 58-59 looks. All the elements were from her paintings. She used to feel that snails and shells were some of the biggest signs from the universe given to mankind and they unlocked the entire map of the universe. Even the bustier in the swimwear has all the spiral elements.
At the end of the day, we are a luxury holiday brand and we want everybody to come to us whether they are holidaying, travelling or celebrating in any part of the world... beach, mountains, safari and ski. So, you see a gamut of beach dresses, resort dressing to glamorous cocktail parties to dinners and saris and destination wedding clothes.
Staying with menswear, how are men shopping?
One of the biggest booms in our business has been menswear. In the last three-four years since we started doing menswear, I cannot tell you the pace at which menswear is growing as a category.
We are also helping the men break free from traditional silhouettes that they can only wear a polo or a bandhgala or sherwani. All the silhouettes that you see, you see the print language and the colour, with every look, we are breaking grounds to say this is as masculine as it looks and you don’t have to question your sexual identity, but, at the same time, it is a wide spectrum. No matter where you stand in this spectrum, you will be able to find a look for yourself in this collection.
It would still take a lot of guts to wear some of the pieces in the collection!
(Narresh laughs) You have to always give people hope and dream. For a lot of women I know, they might not buy this off the runway, but it pushes them to think beyond certain constraints. The fact that you can stretch their imagination to go outside is actually what fashion can do for anybody. That’s a contribution that fashion has in our society.
Is sheer a big trend in menswear?
Yes and the underlying reason being that body positivity is finally moving from women to men. It’s not that sheer shirts are only being worn by extremely fit men now. Regular men are wearing sheer shirts and the trend has trickled down to high-street brands. There is a greater acceptance of loving their bodies for what it is.