Kavad Art






  Ever seen this before?! 





Here is the artist with the panels of this beautiful masterpiece open!

Any idea what this is? At first glance, it just looks like a series of pictures. What does it represent?


 A STORY!!

Who does not like stories?!

 
Kavad Art is a unique tradition of crafting stories on a wooden box from the state of Rajasthan. 

The 'Kavad' is a portable wooden shrine which contains visual narratives of Gods, Saints, local heroes etc on its panels. It is created by combining the expertise and efforts of a carpenter (called a Sutar), an  artist (called a Chitrakaar) and a story teller (called a Bhat). The Kavadia Bhats travel around and narrate the story depicted in the box. These boxes are made only in a village called Bassi, in Rajasthan. 


This art form dates back 400 years. The Sutar community started making these wooden boxes from Mango and Selam trees using simple tools. Once the boxes were made, the Chitrakaar hand painted the beautiful characters to depict various scenes of the story. Initially the colours used were made from natural dyes but over the years they have started using mineral powder colours available in the market. Traditionally the base colour of the Kavad boxes was always red but these days they make them in different colours to suit the market needs.


These days the Kavad boxes are being sold as decor items since the number of people who listen to the Kavadia Bhats have dwindled and they have had to look for alternate ways to generate income. They have started customizing the boxes to suit the taste and demands of the customers. 


Let us do our bit to support these artists and keep this tradition alive.

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