Arts and Markets

Yesterday we first spent looking at the work of a family of award winning master craftsmen who paint fantastically detailed temple hangings using natural dyes applied with sharpened bamboo sticks onto mordanted cotton. You can read more about mata ni pachedi in an earlier post, but Sanjay and his parents and siblings are all hugely skilled in this art. After a quick demo by Sanjay, we all spent a very concentrated few hours creating our own small simplified versions. The most complex designs have multiple colours, each applied separately then fixed over many days. Ours were one and two colour versions, varying in style rather dramatically from one another.  Here you can see Jeni focused on creating a mermaid surrounded by fishes while Sanjay dashes off a miniature masterpiece!