Handmade In The By-lanes by Ritu Sethi
Even in the most urbanised parts of India, if you were to pause on the streets as the world goes past, you could get a haircut, your shoes repaired, your ears cleaned, perhaps your mattress opened out, a window chik woven, and your knives and scissors sharpened. Clothes can be exchanged for new utensils, a flower garland made to your specification, and you can even be fed a sumptuous meal while being entertained by an acrobatic performance.
Ingeniously adapted to their circumstances, much of India’s services and products continue to be custom-made and available in villages, as well as luxurious couture stores. Behind all these practices lie the millions of makers whose skill, and use of the simplest tools, spans a cultural landscape that has for millennia been bound by history, mythology and legend.
While we all know of the finest spun pashminas, the shimmering silks of Banaras, the Chola bronzes and Kundan jewellery, what remains unsung are the extraordinary crafts that sprawl our urban streets, becoming quotidian.
Every part of the wild perennial Sarkanda grass that grows in dried river beds has a use. The long thick stems made into furniture, its outer husk used to thatch roofs, its thin top-half coiled into baskets while its feathery leaf — the Munj, twisted into sturdy ropes. The crafting of the low-priced light-weight furniture is based on the principle of double-layering, with the stems ingeniously twisted in opposite directions to both construct and strengthen the hollow base. The range of furniture and sizes include the moda or round stool, armchairs with curved backrests, sofas, tables, all sold on street corners by vendors, their cycles piled with precariously balanced products.
The ubiquitous hand-forged scissors of Meerut for specially-purposed use are the preferred choice for barbers, paper-cutters, leather artisans, designers and tailors — with heavy-weight scissors slicing through 16-folds of fabric at one go. These scissors are forged with specific blades, with defined weights and lengths that can either be tapered or blunt tipped to match its usage pattern, their sizes varying from 6 to 16 inches. The handles cast in brass are fused onto the blades, their grip ergonomically designed to exert power and precision. Made of up-cycled carbon steel salvaged from railway rolling-stock and the automobile industry, the blades are riveted together with an adjustable metal screw that allows for replacement, rebalancing and repair. Reputed to last beyond a hundred years, it makes true the maxim of the Dada le, potaabarpe — ‘bought by the grandfather, and still in use by the grandson’. What makes the Meerut scissor even more special is that unlike other scissors, it is not a throwaway object — being repairable, re-adjustable, able to be resharpened as many times as required.
The presence of the hand-beaten micro-thin metal leaf gold and silver Varaq found most famously on Indian desserts, and biryani, is a must on special-occasion foods. Used also in gilding icons, deities, rituals and decorative objects of metal, Varaq is also applied onto wall murals and interiors. The applications on paintings extend from the miniature arts on paper to the ritual textile arts used to illuminate manuscripts, and religious book covers. It is also extensively used in textiles — from clothing, to ritual flags, and in the past on palanquin covers and tent hangings. Its application in ways both sacred and secular, speaks eloquently of the skills of craftsmanship and the abilities of crafts persons to adopt material to myriad usage. However all that glitters is not gold as these gossamer leaf-beaters of precious metals, whose craft we see around us continue to remain unknown across their many centres in India.
Overlooked, yet eternal are crafts spanning our annual festivals displayed and celebrated across India. The effigy of Ravana — the demon king built with paper, bamboo and filled with firecrackers; to Uttarayana celebrated in Ahmedabad with the flying of paper kites. Elaborately and painstakingly made on the occasion of Durga puja is the sculpting of Ganpathi Baba in Shola Pith and clay, worshipped and then ritually relinquished into the waters. The Sanjhi floor decorations, created with intricately cut paper stencils filled in with colours, celebrating events in the life of Lord Krishna, hours in the making to be effaced after the unveiling and offerings.
From playful and inventive toys to the floral arts, painstakingly made for celebrations and presentations, these crafts encircle and surround our everyday. The accessible and frequented nature of these crafts are what make them invisible, undervalued and easily forgettable. The craftsmanship and skill required is usually overlooked due to the physical space they occupy in society, not seen on gallery walls, or hotel lobbies; instead on the roads, in our alleyways and in our cooking. These ‘everyday’ crafts are bespoke and personalized by the craftsperson, the knowledge of their making passed on between and across generations through oral instruction and apprenticeship, outside of brick-and-mortar schools, with no textbooks and no exams, but a lifetime of learning and innovating on the job.
The time is now, to pause, to look again and see the extraordinary in the ordinary.
This essay is part of a quarterly art and design print newspaper called The Irregular Times. To subscribe to our newspaper, visit us here.
