Nishra Ranpura

Work / TEACHING

Nishra is involved in various teaching and mentorship roles in academic, organizational, as well as communal settings. Her pedagogy is grounded in accessible, empirical and grassroots learning. She values process and experimentation.

Crafted Identities • 2021-2024

Research Essay on the technological transformations in textile design

AP CSP Curriculum Design • 2023

Visual curriculum and website design

Digital Fabrication • Spring 2023

Teaching an undergraduate class focused on modern fabrication processes and technologies around socially and culturally relevant themes

xFab Lab • Fall 2022

Teaching an MFA class focused on modern fabrication processes and technologies around socially and culturally relevant themes

Speculative Spaces • 2022

An illustrated talk about Speculative Spaces and infrastructures of the futures with a multi-disciplinary cohort of creators

The Weaver • 2022

A multi-sensory mixed-media installation and performance about embodied weaving

Crafted Machines • 2022

A talk on cultures and communities of machines

Jugaad: about a culture of looms • 2022

Accessibility and frugal innovation around novel DIY looms

Interweaving Interfaces: A Memoir • 2022

A critically fabulated memoir about collective intelligence through theories, philosophies, and applications of textiles

Tex-taal • 2022

Dancing speakers and whispering ghungroos, an e-textile dialogue

Materiality of Time: Wonderings • 2022

Musings about materiality of time and temporal experiences through materials

Brushwork • 2011-present

Weaving Time • 2022

What is it like to experience time and temporalities through weaving?

Touch me or not • 2022

An emotional textile that remembers a touch, an e-textile exploration

Bridging Exchange • 2021

A proposal to redesign Thomas Greene Park in Brooklyn, NY

Core Studio 1: 3D • Fall 2021

Teaching an undergraduate class focused on exploring the fundamentals of 3D media- materials, form, space, and installation

Contemporary Weaving • 2015-present

Workshops teaching handloom, powerloom, and/or computational weaving techniques

An animated short film

What the duck! • 2021

Toy design methodology and prototyping

Trackster • 2021

A new species of surveilling cyborgs is breeding amongst us...

Boxie (he/him/his) • 2021

Shipping boxes coming alive

Baby-Oxy (she/her/hers) • 2021

Oximeters coming alive

Once upon a time in NYC • 2021

Animated shorts anthropomorphising New York city's inanimate objects' feelings during Covid-19 lockdown

Dark Data • 2021

a web-zine design on the topics of data privacy, surveillance, misuse of data, and data speculations

સ્વ- (Self-) • 2021-present

Research paper on an ongoing inquiry into representation of the self through data physicalization and the birth of 'Ethnocrafting'

E-Rigveda • 2020

A data-feminism map of the oldest sanskrit scripture

About personal space • 2020

A soft-structure motion library and proposed installation of different non-verbal communicative gestures around the notion of personal space

Textile Industry's patronage toward a polarized Ahmedabad • 2020

An overview of how the textile industry shaped the urban and cultural landscape of Ahmedabad (India).

Mirror Mirror • 2020

A week of vanity, a data-portrait

Nishra's Fortress of Solitude • 2020

An autobiographical experience game

Carnatic clock • 2020

A clock based on Indian Carnatic music

Room Scenes • 2020

Interior design and modelling for area rugs

Heimtextil • 2020

International trade fair display of material research, forecast analysis, and design development for home textiles

Prathaa • 2016-2019

Bringing the essence of several traditional Indian crafts into a commercial dobby-loom-woven collection

Phygital Pixtile • 2019

Illustration and printed-textile design

Humanium • 2019

Textile research, forecast analysis, and a narration, for 2020's Spring Summer woven fabrics

The Curator: Keeper of the arts • 2018

Textile research, forecast analysis, and a narration, for 2019-2020's Autumn Winter woven fabrics

Ashima • 2018

Website design, branding, styling, and photography

Retreat: Inspired living • 2018

Textile research, forecast analysis, and a narration, for 2019's Spring Summer woven fabrics

Riverberation • 2017

Textile research, forecast analysis, and a narration, for 2018-2019's Autumn Winter woven fabrics

Psychology • 2017

Textile research, forecast analysis, and a narration, for 2018's Spring Summer woven fabrics

Hoot • 2014-2016

Materializing the enigma of Owls into textiles

Materializing different types of lights into textiles

Handloom Weaving • 2011-present

Handwoven swatch gallery

Architecture Ethos • 2015

Materializing architecture into textiles

Hide and Seek • 2015

A recycled organic cotton, indigo and non-indigo apparel collection, for kids

Pandora's Box • 2015

A mixed-media installation and performance about the tale of Pandora's Box

Colourcall • 2015

Spatial design and visual merchandise for NIFT

Matrimandir • 2015

Materializing architecture into textiles

My Tsunami Story • 2014

Painting and textile skill development workshop for women seeking to support their families affected by the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami

A play of Taana Vaana (warp weft) • 2014

an ethnographic craft research and documentation of brocades of Gujarat, India

Aquabloom • 2013

Object study of water lily through material-texture explorations and print design

Poetry • 2011-present