ASHIESH SHAH
Born in Mumbai, Ashiesh Shah graduated in Interior Architecture from the Parsons School of Design in New York. Even though he started his career in New York, he returned to India and launched his own atelier in 2017. Shah is the founder and creative director of Ashiesh Shah Architecture + Design. Finding a semblance between art, architecture, and design, Shah is leading various high-end projects in India and outside. From office spaces and penthouses to concept stores and restaurants, Shah’s portfolio is extensive and diverse.
Shah was invited by NITI Aayog as a Champion of Change in Transforming India through G2B Partnerships. His exhibition ‘Sustain: The Craft Idiom’ was a specially curated cultural project for the 2nd G20 CWG Meeting in 2023, organised in Bhubaneswar, Odisha, by the Ministry of Culture, Government of India. In 2018, he collaborated with the Times of India group to curate and develop a Design Exhibition, ‘D-code’, which showcased the best in design from around the world.
About The Work
Courtesy of Nature Morte, New Delhi
Ashiesh Shah and his atelier pay homage to the traditional craftsmanship of India through compositions of inventiveness that amalgamate experimentation, empowerment, and technique into a creative ecosystem for collaboration and development. His Stambhs start with cosmic forms unique to Indian geometry and take inspiration from traditional crafts techniques, often not well-known and in danger of being forgotten completely. Two of the stambhs start with Channapatna beads of Karnataka, in both convex and concave forms, dynamic to touch and therapeutic to rotate. Another stambh exploits the white metal patrawork of Rajasthan, fusing both spherical and ovoid volumes. These three stambhs can be unstacked to become functional stools. The fourth stambh uses the wrought iron and figurative language associated with the Bastar community of Chhattisgarh. This stambh can be dissembled to function as a table with four chairs. Shah’s “Utkata Bench” is a functional sculpture with a comical character. Its proportions give it a very solid appearance, its two large feet firmly anchoring it to the ground.