Kallol Datta Unpacks The Truths And The Lies We Wear With His New Solo Exhibition

There’s nothing neutral about what we wear—and Kallol Datta’s new exhibitionat Experimenter–Colaba lays that bare. Opening July 10, ‘Volume IV: Truths, Half-Truths, Half-Lies, Lies’ maps the quiet, enduring ways clothing continues to carry politics.

The seed of this exhibition was planted in 2022, inside a university library in London. Datta came across ‘Lessons for Women’, a Han dynasty text written by China’s first known female historian, Ban Zhao. Framed as advice to her daughters, the document reads like a rigid instruction manual for how to live acceptably—how to behave, speak, move, bathe, clean, and of course, how to dress. “I was amazed because a lot of the texts seemed like speeches at political rallies, globally, today,” Datta says. “Societal codes haven’t changed much, across centuries, regions, and cultures with regards to rights for minorities and people at risk. The situation hasn’t changed for the dominant forces who continue to commit and push to legitimise human rights violations.”

This is far from a new concern in Datta’s practice. Over the years, the Kolkata-based artist has built a language of dress that resists spectacle, trend, and even the term ‘fashion’ itself. In fact, Datta often distances himself from the industry entirely, preferring to call himself a dressmaker rather than a designer—a reflection of both humility and political stance. “The hyper-nationalism that has engulfed craft, design, with makers producing works with fascist undertones” is something he’s openly critical of. In that sense, ‘Volume IV’ is a continuation of the same ethics that have defined his earlier shows: a refusal to conform, a questioning of systems, and a deep, methodical engagement with history.

Datta’s response wasn’t to translate or reinterpret the text, but to investigate the systems it represents. The show is structured across four ‘truth-states’: ‘Truths Our Clothes Told Us,’ ‘Half-Truths Our Clothes Told Us,’ ‘Half-Lies Our Clothes Told Us,’ and ‘Lies Our Clothes Told Us’. Each chapter acts like a lens—peering into how clothing has been used not only to reflect identity, but to regulate and suppress it. “The project and by extension the solo position themselves as a series of creative and critical interventions through living textile archives, navigating the public and the private, the historical and the contemporary,” he explains. “The division of the project into chapters allowed for a deliberate, reflective process of reimagining, unlearning, and challenging dominant histories.”

These aren’t hypothetical explorations. The textiles that make up the work—donated, second-hand, and reclaimed—arrive embedded with memory. “Every donated or reclaimed item of clothing or textile is accompanied by interviews, written correspondence, photo albums that articulate episodic events, memories, and information contained in the donations,” he says. “Often, there are immediate tie-ins with the inputs provided by the donors to my projects and the research I undertake.” The garments, in that sense, are not materials—they’re evidence.

The pieces were made at ‘Ek Tara Creates’, a social enterprise in Kolkata. Working outside the pace of fashion’s seasonal churn, Datta treats slowness as essential. “By being slow, conscious, and contemplative in my practice, I attempt to foreground care as a connective principle in the research, making and exhibiting stages of a project.” That rhythm has long defined his approach—rejecting industry-led productivity cycles in favour of meaningful, sometimes meditative, processes. “Textiles age differently in the Indian Subcontinent,” he explains. “They age faster. With reclaimed and donated cloth there is a certain level of restorative and palliative care that has to be provided.”

In some ways, Datta’s rejection of the fashion industry is also a form of refusal—a resistance to the kind of design culture that prizes visibility over values. It’s why his work often confounds categorisation: it doesn’t behave like fashion, even when it looks like clothing. And it doesn’t try to participate in the performance of activism—it simply, quietly, lives it.

In ‘Volume IV’, that quiet is palpable. The works don’t shout; they hold space. The gallery itself has been designed to facilitate slow, thoughtful engagement. “The exhibition design and installation of the works within the gallery were also a thought-out, sensitive, and intentional series of dialogue,” he says. “I wish for viewers to feel secure and take their time engaging with the works and have conversations even after the run of the solo.”

This show follows Datta’s previous exhibitions ‘Volume 3 Issue 2’ (2022) and ‘Volume 3 Issue 2 | 2.0’ (2024), both of which explored clothing under imperial control in post-war Japan. But where those shows examined one geography, ‘Volume IV’ moves fluidly between timelines and regions, pulling from centuries-old edicts, religious rules, and cultural codes that still linger in social structures today. “I have been researching historical ‘laws of the land’—sumptuary laws, religious edicts, and imperial proclamations—for quite some time, and their direct impact on social codes and laws in contemporary societies,” he says. “Class dynamics, caste systems poorly hidden behind GDP numbers, controlling the lives of gender and sexual minorities. None of it has really evolved.”

It’s not just history Datta is interested in, it’s how it’s remembered, weaponised, and sometimes conveniently forgotten. In that way, his garments become counter-archives: ways of rewriting dominant narratives, one stitch at a time. “The research conducted is never done with the making of a new body of work or exhibitions in mind,” he says. “This allows for different methodologies, time, and required pauses. Pacing facilitates meaningful, collaborative exercises.”

The practice, like the person, resists the linear. “I do experience periods of exhaustion,” he admits. “But I am incredibly privileged wherein I am able to rush off for a break when that happens. I am also a list-maker. Colour coded, detailed lists. That helps me keep on top of things and meet deadlines.”

There’s nothing detached about Datta’s work. It may look minimal or restrained, but it holds volumes. It is rigorous, yes, but it is also emotionally attuned—aware that clothes carry not just stories, but systems.

And what he’s building with ‘Volume IV’ isn’t just a critique of dress codes or historical edicts. It’s a broader, quieter act of resistance. It’s a call to examine what we’ve been told, and what we’ve worn—willingly or otherwise.

‘Volume IV: Truths, Half-Truths, Half-Lies, Lies’ is on view from July 10 to August 20, 2025, at Experimenter–Colaba, Mumbai.