A colourful journey

Art is not what you see, but what you make others see, and that is exactly what was visible at the Bengaluru Art and Craft festival recently. The fest, which was held at Chitrakala Parishath, had 20 stalls depicting different art works not only from Rajasthan but from other parts of the country also.

The exhibition had a wide array of beautiful handcrafted artwork, paintings, jewellery and more. Many of the exhibitors were small-scale entrepreneurs who make and sell their works through social media and websites.

On display were eye catching clothes, vibrant and handmade items, oil paintings, Rajasthani ‘jhula’, home-grown plants, accessories such as phone covers, purses made from old unused jeans, etc. The exhibition had many young entrepreneurs displaying their creativity in full form. Huddled into their little stalls, they displayed beautiful pieces of art work, all unique in its own way. The traditional Rajasthani works were seen in some of the saris and earrings for sale.

“We love our product and design from our heart,” says Bengaluru-based Rajni Jajodia, a young entrepreneur who studied at NIFT.

She displayed handmade saris, neckpieces and many more such things through the traditional weaving method along with her partner Nitu Priya. ‘Zilpakala’, a stall filled with beautiful handpainted containers with many indoor plants in them, was presented by Raji Krishna.

Raji says, “I want to create an eco-friendly environment with lots of trees and plants and also make gardens look beautiful”. Miniature gardens and terrarium plants are some of the things she grows. Divya Jannu, another young enthusiast loves to make quilling paintings. She says, “Quilling paintings aren’t very common in India and I like to make my paintings very Indianised.”

Her biggest painting is of Shiva and Parvathi and took three days to make. Another attraction was a Nagaland stall which had dry flowers and bamboo items.

Sebastian, the person in-charge, says that loose flowers are taken and put together here and that arranging dried flowers are a hallmark of creativity in Nagaland. Another stall had furniture from Rajasthan which was made of teak and brass and gives you a royal feel.

Nalini Venkatesh Murthy says, “It is a family business and we bring the products from Rajasthan. These are handmade designs.” The exhibition on the whole gave art connoisseurs a peek into an exotic world of art.