For its first ever global Diwali campaign Bvlgari commissioned famed Indian artist Doyel Joshi for a special installation of 4,500 hand-sculpted terracotta elements, inspired by the traditional diya and shaped in the iconic scales of Bvlgari's Serpenti. Each piece was handcrafted with the Kumhar potter community and local craftswomen through a dedicated social enterprise. Femina sat down with Doyel for an exclusive chat on her thought process, and working on an installation at that scale.
Edited excerpts
Passing the Light centres on 4,500 hand-sculpted terracotta elements inspired by the diya. What drew you to the diya as the starting point, and what did you want people to feel when they encountered it?
When Bvlgari reached out to us... What interested us was the relationship a diya creates: earth is shaped by someone’s hands, then holds a light that someone else will kindle. There is a whole passage between people within that small object. The elements developed through a study of diyas, lanterns, Serpenti scales and modularity. Through repetition, a single form becomes a landscape, while each piece still carries the presence of the person who made it. We wanted that intimacy to survive the scale of the installation. For someone to feel wonder, but also a kind of recognition.. a connection to earth, to another person’s labour, perhaps to something within themselves.
You’ve described terracotta as “not a humble material” but a universal one. Could you unpack that? What do you think we overlook about it?
I find “humble” an interesting word because it reveals how we assign value. Something can be widely available and still hold extraordinary complexity. Terracotta contains knowledge of earth, water, weather, fire and time. Its familiarity can make that knowledge invisible. For us, it is universal because working with earth is part of our shared human history. It exists in homes, rituals, architecture and everyday objects across cultures. You don’t need specialist knowledge to feel a relationship with it. In this work, we wanted to give that familiarity space and attention. To look closely enough that something you might ordinarily pass by becomes something you spend time with.
The installation was made with kumhar artisans and local craftswomen through a social enterprise, and they’re credited as co-creators. What did co-authorship look like in practice, and what did you learn from their way of working?
We brought an intention and a form, and the artisans brought the knowledge through which that form could exist. Their understanding of clay, its possibilities and its limits shaped the work. Even within a repeated module, each person brings their own judgement and touch. Those differences remain part of the installation. Co-authorship means recognising that contribution within the work itself, as well as in its credits. What stayed with us was the attention that was making demands. We spend so much of contemporary life searching for grounding, often through experiences removed from our everyday routines. Working with clay asks you to be present through the act itself. That gave the project a deeper meaning for me, while also making us aware of the physical labour and conditions behind every piece.
Your work with Neil Ghose Balser is collaborative by nature. How did that shape this project, and how did it feel to bring that approach into a partnership with a house like Bvlgari?
Neil and I share a life as well as a practice, so our work grows through an ongoing conversation as individuals, partners and now parents. An idea changes as it moves between us; we question it, live with it and discover what it needs to become. During this project, we became parents to our son, Baarish. The question of inheritance became very immediate: what do we want to keep, what do we need to leave behind, and what will we pass on? Working with Bvlgari opened that conversation onto another history of making. Serpenti offered a starting point for thinking about scales, repetition and transformation. The relationship grew through a shared interest in how knowledge travels between generations, and how each gives it a new expression.
For Neil specifically, being Indian and German has shaped a search for home, roots and grounding through materials and familiar objects. The approach is polyphonic, exploring the layers that make us human through rituals, architecture, movement and gathering. With this project, we’ve also consciously begun working under our individual artist names, giving each voice greater recognition within our shared practice. Bvlgari offered a meaningful setting for this step, while the dialogue between us remains the foundation of our process.
Light and shadow play a big part in how the installation comes alive. How did you think about the way it would be experienced, and what role does the viewer play in completing the work?
We thought about light as part of the material. It reveals the contours of the terracotta, while shadow gives the spaces between the elements their own presence. As you move, those relationships shift; repetition begins to reveal differences. I wanted the work to invite a slower kind of attention. You might first encounter it as a whole landscape, then notice a surface, an irregularity or the trace of a hand. The viewer brings their own pace and memories into that encounter. Someone might recognise a ritual, someone else might respond to the rhythm or warmth of the material. The work leaves room for those different readings.
Diwali is deeply personal for so many of us. Is there a memory or ritual from your own childhood that found its way into this piece?
One thread comes from my mother’s stories about kumhar communities and the significance of their work with earth. Their presence in joyous occasions of births, weddings .. Those stories stayed with me, and this project gave me a way to return to them through my own practice. Diwali also makes me think about how we receive traditions before we fully understand them. We participate, repeat gestures and gradually discover what they mean to us. Becoming a mother during the making of Passing the Light gave that a new emotional weight. I began thinking about what Baarish will receive from us.. not only stories or objects, but ways of caring, making and being with other people. That question found its way into the work: how do we carry something forward while giving it room to change?
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