Light up the darkness!

                                               

                                                       Scenes from Kumartali.

                                                Potters of Kumartali busy with their art.


Let there be light! Light on various strands of existentialism, light on a nation that’s withering away in corruption and finally light on our very souls caged in a body of flesh and blood which forms the basis of our conscience. O lord this is my prayer on deepavali!(festival of lights)

In Vedic cosmology sattva is a guna(fundamental quality) which stands for light, purity, goodness. It is the embryonic emergence that shapes the other two gunas which are rajas and tamas. To put it more coherently, sattva (light) is what shapes and brings balance to dark inanimate objects. Light from the sun permeates through all objects on earth and has created a system of reckoning for all forms of life. All creation is governed by the manifestation of light and a whole universe revolves around it.  However, metaphorically the meaning of light can be refracted through many a prism. Often life has been described to me as a long journey through a tunnel trying to reach the light at its end, and for each one that light has different connotation, it’s the culminating point where the reason of existence meets their expectations. So life becomes a long exodus towards the promised light of fulfillment.

Leaving behind the outer manifestations of light when I look inside myself, I realize that there is a different sort of light---a subtle spiritual mechanism hidden behind the bodily structure, a science of the soul .It is said that all living beings are made in the image of God therefore our souls are anchored in the Divine, which is why a new born baby smiles as it sleeps because its connection to the omnipotent is undisturbed. As an adult, spiritual realism has lately been occupying my thoughts and I turned to the science of yoga to learn about the laws ruling the realms of consciousness so that it would rekindle the light in me and help me comprehend the true nature of matters in my life. My practice of the inner science of yoga continues with the hope that everything in the future will improve by making a spiritual effort in the mind.

Auburn leaves slowly fall from trees above, autumn is here and nature is shedding its old attire to prepare for the new. After hectic months of making idols for durga puja, the potters of Kumartuli in Kolkata have no respite. Blue idols of goddess kali have to be created, the fearful and ferocious dark mother is to be revered on the day of deepavali. The potters wheels are furiously churning, clay is being shaped into the mother goddess and at the same time “diya” or lamps are getting baked to brighten homes in Kolkata. Deepavali  meaning” an array of lights” is a festival that marks the victory of good over evil, darkness being consumed by light and the potters have to work hard to supply the enormous demand for diyas  so that the city can outshine any eclipse. To witness an ancient craft that is passed down from father to son, I arrive at Kumartuli as an insect is drawn towards the light but this time it’s the light of art and creativity. At a time when my nation is passing through trying times politically and economically, I witness a working class of artists employing their skills for survival. Through the exercise of power, vision and work these potters are liberating themselves from poverty which has shackled majority of the masses in India. Their efforts are not futile, the world now recognizes them as the potters who create beautiful idols of goddesses, but  kriya kalash is working on displaying their lesser known creations. I sign off from this blog with the hope that as we work towards creating light for others, we will naturally light our way through life.

                                                    Diyas being painted .

                             
                                                     The finished product.

                                    Different types of diyas (lamps) made by the potters of Kumartali.

If you like the diya or lamps made by the potter community of kumartali, kindly contact us on kriyakalash@gmail.com

Bamboo Reinforced

                                                   A "pandal" in Kolkata.

                                                 Bamboo mugs from Assam.

                               
                                               Deities carved into bamboo roots.

It’s that time of the year again! Goddess Durga has left her celestial abode and come down to earth to visit her maternal home. The city of Kolkata is exhilarated with joy as it welcomes the eternal mother, a magnificent woman with ten hands, a symbol of the divine purging out all evil .Every ‘para’ or lane in the city is constructing a decorative “pandal”, each proclaiming to be better than the other, specimens of artistic ingenuity for their beloved mother to reside. As I drive home from work, each day I witness the cityscape transform, from  skeletal bamboo constructions, lit up high rises to ostentatious ‘pandals’, Kolkata is shinning and alive. It is at this time of the year that the bamboo forms the basis of compound art in the form of “pandals’.

 ‘Uttare charu?/Dhakkhine garu/pube hah/pashime bah’…(kitchen on the north, cow shed on the south, pond/duckery on the east and bamboo groove on the west)…Nayan Gogoi recalls an ancient assamese wisdom that emphasizes the importance of bamboo in homestead planning. Bamboo is his source of livelihood. For years, it has been subjected to his contemplation and been turned to beautiful artistic decorative pieces. Bamboo has been his canvas of expression and the basis of his small business in the village of Dhubri in Assam. The bamboo mugs he makes are a specialty and in demand during the festival of Bihu when “sujen”(alcoholic beverage) is made and drunk in great quantities.

Tucked in the lower ranges of eastern Himalayas is Ziro valley(Arunachal Pradesh), home of the Apatanis. A tribe of nature worshippers , they have mastered the art of land cultivation which has enabled them to be self sufficient through centuries . This unique tribe has developed an indigenous method of growing bamboo that never flowers thus making it immune to rodent and birds. Naturalist and conservationists in their own right, the Apatanis use bamboo in various spheres of their lives. The women are excellent weavers and bamboo is used to make baskets, haversack bags and even kitchen utensils. Bamboo here is a source of utilitarian art that helps the tribe to function through their daily chores.

Three different states,…three different usage of the sturdy bamboo. An object of utility, it is contributing in the process of making beautiful art. Whether it’s the foundation of a pandal or being skillfully carved to make it ornamental or even woven into exceptional utensils distinctive to an isolated tribe , the bamboo has surpassed its role of simply being a poor man’s timber.

                                                         An Apatani tribal woman.
                                                       (photograph courtesy wikipedia)

                                                    Apatani bamboo utensils.

If you would like to purchase the bamboo products on display and help Kriya Kalash promote artisans from the northeast of India, kindly contact us on kriyakalash@gmail.com

Bollywood's Painted Posters

                                          Artists pay tribute to their city on the walls of Matunga railway station.

                                                           Chor bazaar in Mutton Street.

                                               Hand painted poster of the movie "Guide"

Mumbai---City of dreams? City of persistence? City of hustlers ? Every one arrives here with their bag of ambitions and wrestles it out with this giant mammoth of human deluge to either make it or get swallowed. I rolled into Mumbai, one wet morning unsure about whether I should brave the traffic and set out to look for the famed hand painted Bollywood posters of yesteryears. Since I had read that this eclectic dying art form is still found in the lanes of chor bazaar in old Mumbai, I was desperate to find it. I got out of my hotel in Juhu and walked down the street looking for a cab driver who would help me navigate this alien city. After a few minutes of haggling on transportation fares, I was sitting in a black and yellow fiat stuck in traffic, conversing with my cab driver.

Now, Mr. Vibhushan Gupta (the cabbie) is a true blue blooded ‘Mumbaikar’. An old timer of kashmiri descent, he migrated to Mumbai and made it his home decades back. Ever since he has been driving a taxi and could proudly name all the celebrities he has ferried around. The drive was long but conversation colourful, he spoke about his love for classic Bollywood films, shiv-sena and politics, scarcity of  water followed by paralyzing rains. I could sense the amount of love and pride this non Marathi heart had for the city he called home- a city that soars and stinks, inflicts innumerous adversities on its denizens but keeps them going because it never lets them stop dreaming. The dream machine is ever churning pulling more people towards it each day.

Speaking of dreams, bollywood is an industry that sells it and has our nation hypnotized. Mad scientists, hard boiled detectives, sensuous starlets, murderous robots, vengeful goddesses, saucy heroines, super human men-are staples of bollywood movies. It’s an ever evolving genre of motion picture that is constantly swinging between fantasy and realism. Unlike the aggressive marketing propaganda of movies today, bollywood of yesteryears employed simpler tactics. As a child I remember seeing colourful hoardings outside movie theatres depicting the actors in their various facial contortions, from trade mark expressions of romantic nuances, angst from tragedy to violent rage, images all hand painted and pasted above making us mere mortals look up and gape at these celestial beings of cinema. This art form is now scarce. Cinema halls have switched over to cheaper digital prints leaving poster artists with no option but to change their means of livelihood. Most of these artists have disappeared and chor bazaar in Mumbai has the last of these posters. That’s why ,I was on my way, eager to get my hands on this rare form of art.

Chor bazaar which literally means “thieves market” is aptly named since all stolen goods eventually finds its way here. It’s famous for antique items including vintage bollywood posters. As I entered its narrow lanes hopping and skipping trying to avoid pot-holes filled with rain water, I saw the iconic “Mother India” poster on display in one of the shops. Arif is one of the last hand-painted poster sellers on Mutton Street. Like most old things find their way to Chor bazaar, bollywood posters of every decade carefully wrapped in plastic adorn the walls of his tiny shop. Business is slow but Arif has not lost faith Apart from posters there are old gramophone records , movie pamphlets  and even song books. It is a store house of bollywood’s legacy. He still has a few poster artists working for him but orders are not coming in abundance these days .On learning that Kriya Kalash is interested in promoting poster art, Arif  agreed to be a part of the process ,thus enabling us to give new lease of life to this dying art form. Change is a good thing, but to preserve the old even better .Why should an art form this unique fade into oblivion? People like Arif and his poster artists need to get their due. Someone once told me that acceptance and neutrality to matters offers solutions, I now realize how wrong the logic is, because when there is a chance to make things right one should go ahead and be proactive about things and that’s what we at kriya kalash want to do by being in the process of preserving these hand made posters.

                                                              Some other iconic posters

If you would like to buy hand painted bollywood posters kindly contact us on kriyakalash@gmail.com. 

Beads of lore.

                                           
                                            Aka men in tradzy beads

                                    Women with painted faces in all their finery.

                                        Haggling over bride price using twigs.

Sleepless  roosters crowed, stray dogs barked ,cool winds gusted into the mountains making Nimasow shiver as he sat collecting the ritual items: a tigers claw, a pythons jaw, a crystal quartz and other objects that are a part of a Shaman’s kit. He has a ritual to perform today since the village is abuzz about the spirits being unhappy. The harvest has not been good this year.

Nimasow , as his father before, is the Shaman in the tiny village of Palizi, a rustic hamlet on the mountains of Arunachal Pradesh. He belongs to the Aka tribe, which is one of the last isolated tribes of these hills .They are a community of self sufficient set of people who have certain similarities to other Buddhist tribes of Arunachal. The tribe grows its own rice, vegetables, fruits , rear their own hogs and breed cattle, build their houses on silts and speak a unique dialect. It’s a utopian setting untouched by the outside world where life is still primitive and unengineered.

Nimasow is affectionately referred to as ‘Mucrow’ by his people-a term of endearment and apart from his shaman status, he is well known to have a collection of necklaces of yellow stone beads. Now, the Aka have more than 26 words to relate to the beads. Beyond being objects of adornment, beads are a status symbol and even play the part of currency for purchase or exchange. In one of its varied important forms , it is the dowry parents will give their daughters when she becomes a bride, and men of this village will adorn themselves with beaded necklaces on special occasions to show off their status- as Nimasow today. These necklaces are simply made out of yellow stones that used to be found in the river nearby. But now those stones are no longer found and the necklaces have become a precious commodity that the Aka people have inherited from their elders. They believe these necklaces embody the deified spirits of their ancestors.

When I first saw an Aka necklace, I could see certain design similarities to the prayer beads we Tibetans wear but looking closely I realized that it’s a unique artifact having symbolic representation. It stands for a way of life centuries old. The way our ancestors lived when the world to them was flat and sustainability was got from ones immediate surroundings. There has always been a huge connection between people and their landscape and the beads represent that connection by beautifying and also running the economy of this tribe. At a time when rest of the world is committing ecocide, I sit writing about a tribe where men and nature exist in harmony-a race so precious that I had to document them in my blog so people can read about the Aka tribe and their precious beads.

Raja and his terracotta plates....

After a tiring week of flying I found myself on a train heading to Shantiniketan with a friend. As the defecated city landscape waned, green paddy fields, little huts and nature in all its bounty emerged. It is said Maharishi Debendranath Tagore found the town Bhubandanga peaceful, hence named it Shantiniketan and at a time in my life where peace was what I was searching, I found myself in a town that promised it. As I walked with the rusty red earth beneath my feet, I looked around with immense pleasure in my heart. There were huge banyan trees that had children swinging from it, students cycling on the roads with green foliage all around. I was in Rabindranath Tagore’s haven of art and literature, a precious relic of our Indian history which still survives and carries on the Patha Bhavana legacy of Tagore’s school of ideals.

But this blog is not about Tagore instead about a chance encounter I had with an artist at a studio in Shantiniketan. After taking in the sights and sounds of the famous Kala Bhavan and meeting various young artists who are paving their way into the art world, I was in absolute awe. Here I was meeting free thinkers amalgamating what they were taught with their individual thoughts to create a new impression in the Indian art scene. We were invited to their studio to look at their works. Huge canvases were on display as a testament of the artist’s sweat and hard-work, from tea-stained pixel art to modern contemporary art, all trying to state its creators mind. Bound by the limits of my understanding I started moving through each artist’s station taking in all that was displayed. Then in one corner I saw Mr Raja aka Rajendra Kumar Pradhan deeply engrossed in his work. Holding a brush,his hand steadily moved across his blue painting, I watched him work silently too scared to disturb a man engrossed in his art. Beside him there were certain terracotta plates that caught my eye. Now, images do not change the world, but they certainly provoke reactions in people and I was completely taken in by what I saw--beautiful images depicting scenes from the epic battle of Mahabharata, Maa Durga standing in all her glory, her multiple hands all stretched out radiating ‘shakti’(powerful strength),our Indian gods, goddesses, warriors and demons of yore all sketched and posing in circular plates of clay. I waited as its maker silently looked up at us from his work and stood to greet us with his hands folded into a 'namaste'. I instead reached out and shook Raja’s hand and decided that kriya kalash had to display this artist’s work. We are dealing with artifacts and terracotta plates made by this shantiniketan artist needed a larger audience. So here I am writing about Raja and his painted plates. If my readers like these plates kindly contact us at kriyakalash@gmail.com.    

Dhokra art (using the lost wax casting technique)

                                                (measurements 4' 3")

                                             
                                                    (measurements 5' 3'')

                                              (Dhokra wall hanging)

Making a mound of earth, wax and frankincence paste, Sanjay applies it over  the clay surface. He draws inspiration from his surroundings. Sita, the village belle carrying a pot of water in her head, Radhika, the matriarch standing outside her hut with her child, Tiwari marching to his field with plough in hand or Pintoo and the village band of musicians are all cast into thin still metal figures. The process is lengthy but Sanjay is a master at it, he is a dhokra damar tribesman settled in Burdwan district of West Bengal where dhokra art has found its permanent root of resurgence. With a thread, he then makes a filigree of designs on his pasted models and then burns the clay on fire and beewax. A pot of molten metal (usually brass) is carefully poured by him into the clay cast and left to dry in the sun. After drying, the mould is broken and flawless metal figurines which are miniature imitations of his village brethren emerge.

 Dhokra is an ancient art form that can be traced back to the figurines found in the mohenjo-daro sites of the Indus valley civilization. It has been diminished to a dying art form but in the villages of Jharkhand, West Bengal and Odisha certain tribes still practice this classical art. Sanjay Karmakar of Burdwan and Rajkishor Shou from Odisha are two such artists who have made this traditional Indian style their livelihood thus adopting the primitive vocation of their ancestors.

Paraja is the first realistic novel I read which describes the predicament of the tribes of Odisha. It poignantly describes through an epic tale the slow decline of a tribal patriarch and his family from subsistence livelihood to bondage to the local money lender. Gopinath Mohanty, a great Oriya literary figure was a government servant and witnessed the plight of these tribes first hand and penned it down his book. From having their land taken away by the government to the migratory lifestyle they have adopted to earn a livelihood...... exploitation at every aspect of their life as urbanity crept in.That is why it’s a wonder that some tribesmen have still retained their art and are trying to make a living out of it. Now, we at Kriya Kalash want to be a part of the resurgence process of dhokra art and bring a purity of intent to the creative commitment of these rural artists by exhibiting their works in our blog.

                                                                                

 If you would like to be a part of the process too and show your support by buying their figurines, kindly contact us on kriyakash@gmail.com  (price on request)

tie and dye (bandini)

                                       Bandini fabric drying in the sun.

                                         
                                  Janis joplin in a tie and dye outfit at woodstock.

                                       
                                          A bandini saree.

In 1967, Michael McClure led the crowd chanting “OM” at the San Francisco’s Golden Gate and started off the “hippie” movement. A movement that pursued the realization of individuality based on the fundamental ethos of being in harmony with nature. A time when power had become all pervasive and there was no ideology left, the youth decided to get back to the core value system that humanity stands for-peace, love and harmony. Never was the Indian connection so strong, hippies grew their hair long, wore psychedelic colorful clothes and conformed to eastern philosophy. Artistic experimentation especially in music was huge but perhaps the most prominent remnant of that generation is their Organically ‘tie and dyed’ colorful clothes.

Now, in western India women have been using organic methods to make their clothes colorful since ancient times. Bandini or bandhej is an art of 'tie and dye’ practiced mainly in the states of Rajasthan and Gujarat. By using simple techniques of dyeing fabrics like cotton and muslin that are tied tightly with a thread, various patterns like Lehriya, Mothda, Ekdali and Shikari are created. Each village has its own unique pattern of dots and stripes made in pink, green, yellow, red by their women in the backyards of their homes.

As I mentioned in my previous blog a visit to Gujarat got me the opportunity to witness women living in a village near Rajkot make bandini fabric. Pools of colored water had fabric soaked in it. Vegetable dyes were being used to keep the process earthy and organic. Unlike the West where tie and dye was used to uphold an ideology on what life ought to be (a gentle nondoctrinaire ideology of peace, love and personal freedom), here in this village that ideology was a way of life. Human beings living peacefully in harmony with nature, sustaining themselves with an ancient art form that enabled their women financial and personal freedom. As I stood there, I remembered college days where I would wear psychedelic tees and flaunt an ideology that I didn’t truly grasp till now. Being a hippie didn’t just mean a hedonistic lifestyle, it was about free expression and essentially a striving for realization of one’s relationship to life and other people. These rural women around me had no idea about the profound impression their simple bandini had made in my mind. They lived a life in communal harmony where basic food clothing and shelter mattered and had no complications of modern life. Promoting their work would give me a sense a pride since I would be adding a tie and dye art form made in India to Kriya Kalash thus allowing me to be steeped in my roots but branching it out all over the place…

If you would like bandini (tie and dye) fabric from India, kindly contact us on kriyakalash@gmail.com