The city of Calcutta is known for its long romance with books, cinema and culture and matters of classical allegiance. Most of the homes of the educated citizens in Calcutta invariably have a space allotted for books. They are treated as valuable assets and are passed on from one generation to the next, much in the same way as cultural sensibilities and social values
We feature here a normal city house that assumes extraordinary proportions by playing host to over ten thousand books on various subjects and interest areas besides being an excellent home. The bookshelves have a strong presence and have greatly influenced the internal ambiance. Much of it has been employed to create thematic continuity.
Aloke Kumar, CEO Usha Martin Internet Company was born amongst books. His father, Late Nirmal Chandra Kumar, was one of the first antiquarians in India. He collected books, maps, prints, artefacts and objects d'art from all over the world, particularly India. His interest ranged from British India to Brittany, from Flora to Fauna, from Artefacts to Anthropology.
“I grew up in an environment of books. Thousands and thousands of them lined the walls of our home. I remember seeing them all. Elephant folio prints of Daniell, hand coloured lithographs of birds by Audubon, aquatinted prints of plants by Roxburgh, reproduction of Balthazar Solvyns, Madam Belenos, sketches of Emily Eden and others. Though I never made any exclusive attempt to remember these pictures nor the painters as a child, I was amazed with myself when I grew up - I could recall paintings, identity artists and even detect frauds. My father had kept them in a way he felt suitable. The books were not arranged by subjects. I always felt that there was a total chaos in the jumbled way that these books were shelved. However, I came to know later there was an order in this madness".
The current collection, much downsized, is housed at Salt Lake. Kumar chose this house as it was laid out in split levels. The entire ground floor has been dedicated for the collection. The old shelves have been lined on the wails which do not have windows. Books arranged by subjects or chronology would have looked like a museum or more like a library. Instead they have been kept in the same unbridled order as one felt aesthetically fit for one's own use. For example all paintings, artefacts and objects of art related to the Far East were clubbed together. So were books on Calcutta. Bengali books went along with the innumerable items used in the Hindu ways of life. The books have been interlaced with artefacts and other objects.
From being in the newspaper to being involved in the creation of a Heritage Park in Calcutta provided Kumar both with the inclination and opportunities of collecting books and materials related to folk art. These too found their way into the existing collection and started inter-mingling, with objects which were more than a thousand years old. “I started seeing architecture as basically a 'play with space' - like music, like newspaper design and for that matter any design. At some imaginary point, the newspaper column, the architectural space and the musical segment merged together."
The expansive spatial volume at the ground floor reduces telescopically towards the upper levels. A single flight of steps leads one up to the dining area above the scooter park at mezzanine level and then on to lounge at first floor. The flavour of polished wood, rich embroidered silk upholstery and countless artefacts and paintings occasionally offset by a brick red surface on the wall or the ceiling continues right up to the lounge on the first floor. While the split level arrangement facilitates visual continuity, the decor strives successfully to achieve thematic continuity.
Additional bits of space at the vertices of the sides of the pentagonal dining room have been used for display. The long vertical openings bringing in sunlight in rather unusual proportions and the high inclined ceiling provide a distinct grandness in scale to the dining area. There is an excellent view of the bookshelves below as well as the lounge with brick red ceiling above. The lounge is more of a transition space between the bedrooms above and the dining below. The kitchen is open yet shielded from view simply by its orientation, facilitated by the shape of land and building form.
There is a lot of old material -polished mahogany, metal artefacts embellished with layers of patina and of course the awesome collection of books. An attempt to balance the interiors has been made by controlled juxtapositions and occasional punctuation by patches of colour, paintings - like the aquatinted print of Solvyns -or a contrasting accessory. And this continued throughout the house - books have been interleaved with paintings and objects with no geometric or predictable alignment whatsoever. The paintings hang not like pictures on the wall, but photographs as in a newspaper, randomly aligned to draw one's attention. One can move from one to the other without any distraction.
Kumar demonstrates uncanny sensitivity in furnishing both the public and private spaces with careful attention paid to both. Somehow the entire house teases the visitor by tending to be perceived as a museum -rather personalised- at one moment and a dexterously appointed home at the next. This ambivalent disposition blended with the free flowing internal volume is perhaps the strength of its interiors. Amidst the apparent lack of grammatical order and predictability lies the charm and unseen feeling of joy. The whole of it is a mosaic.
Text : Ashish Acharjee. Photographs : Asis Sanyal