KALAMKARI, an art from South India :)

Kalamkari = kalam + kari
kalam means pen and kari means craftmanship, so Kalamkari means drawing with pen. But here I'm not discussing about pen/pencil drawing, but I want to tell you all about this truely amazing textile-printing technique.

This craft started at Machilipatnam in Andhra pradesh (India) during the Mughals and Golconda Sultanate. There are two styles of this art: one Srikalahasti Style, and the other Machalipatnam Style. Kalamkari art has been practised by many families in Andhra Pradesh and has constituted their livelihood.

It refers to a method of painting natural dyes onto cotton or silk fabric with a bamboo pen or kalam, using only natural dyes. This style includes flowers around temples and their patronage and have had areligious identity - scrolls, temple hangings, chariot banners, depicted deities and scenes taken from the great hindu epics - Ramayana, Mahabarata, Puranas and the mythological classics.

Technique
The cotton fabric gets its glossiness by immersing it for an hour in a mixture of myrabalam (resin) and cow milk. Contours and reasons are then drawn with a point in bamboo soaked in a mixture of jagri fermented and water; one by one these are applied, then the vegetable dyes. After applying each color, the Kalamkari is washed. Thus, each fabric can undergo up to 20 washings. Various effects are obtained by using cow dung, seeds, plants and crushed flowers.

New Asian Pop Art

Artist: Ketna Patel

An Indian artist, lived in three diffirent continents. her creations show her
personal experiences, cultural immigration, observations of popular and
high culture. Here are some of her amazing work.

Find more about her on
www.ketnapatel.com

Kitsch 'Indian' :)

Kitsch is a German word denoting art that is considered an inferior, tasteless copy of anything and everything. The style of art or a worthless imitation of art of recognized value. It uses elements that may be thought of as cultural icons making cheap mass-produced objects that are unoriginal is associated with the concept as well. Kitsch also refers to the types of art those have aesthetic deficiency.

Let me show you a few but very interesting examples of Indian Kitsch Art :)

FIBRE---->YARN---->FABRIC...

Food, Clothing and Shelter are the three basic needs of life. Food to survive and protect from diseases, house to live in, clothes for protection against climate, for modesty and beauty, and also to show status. The material that you use for clothing is called fabric. It’s a long process to get fabric for clothing. And I believe, if you use fabric you should little bit about how it reached from Fibre to Fabric.
FIBRE
Do you know what fabrics are made of? Take a cloth and pull out a thread. Untwist to loosen this thread. You will see that it is made up of smaller threads or hair like strands. Pull out one of these. This single hair like strand is called a fibre.

A fibre is a hair like strand from which all fabrics are made.

Fibre Classification:

Natural Fibres:
Some fibres are obtained from natural sources, that is, from plants and animals. Fibres from such sources are called natural fibres. Some examples of fibres from natural sources are cotton, Jute, silk, wool, etc.
Man-made Fibres:
The other type of fibres are obtained from chemical substance. These are called manmade fibres. They are rayon, polyester, nylon, acrylic (cashmilon) etc.

YARNS
Do you remember pulling a thread from a cloth and opening it? That thread which was made of fibres is called yarn.

A yarns is a continuous strand made up of a number of fibres which are twisted together.

The process of making yarns from fibres is called spinning.

FABRIC
Fabrics are made in two ways:
1. Weaving
2. Knitting

Weaving:
You all must have seen the seat of a chair or a chaarpai made with nylon or cotton. These are made with tape - when two sets of tapes are interlaced with each other at right angles.Similarily a fabric is also made by interlacing two sets of yarns at right angles. This whole process of interlacing two sets of yarns at right angles to make a fabric is called weaving.

Knitting:
Pick up a sweater and any other woven fabric and compare the two? Yes, in case of a sweater, there is interlocking of loops. You must have seen your mumma or grandma knitting sweaters with needles. If you try to do it yourself, you will see that every time you make new loops from previous ones the length increases. Knitting is also done on machines. Besides sweaters, you can make other garments also. For example, T-Shirts.

There is another innovative technique for making fabric called 'Nonwoven', which is neither woven nor knitted still used world-wide and very helpful for Sustainability...soon I'll discuss about this amazing fabric too.

King of Pop Art, Andy Warhol

Andy Warhol (1928-87), was named Andrew Warhola by his parents when he was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in 1928. Andy showed an early talent in drawing and painting. In 1945 he entered the Carnegie Institute of Technology (now Carnegie Mellon University) where he mastered in pictorial design. Moved to New York at the age of twenty-one to become a commercial artist. This occupation gave him experience in silkscreen printing, which became he medium of choice. Warhol began making paintings of familiar objects such as soup cans and brillo pads. After a short period of hand-painting these works, Warhol began to use mechanical techniques to mass-produce his images. His interest in popular culture expanded as he began to depict celebrities and newspaper clippings in his prints. Warhol also created films and worked with the rock band, The Velvet Underground.

POP ART

An art movement and style that had its origins in England in the 1950s and made its way to the United States during the 1960s. Pop artists have focused attention upon familiar images of the popular culture such as billboards, comic strips, magazine advertisements, and consumer products. In many respects it was influenced by the consumer boom that followed the end of the Second World War, and greatly coincided with the youth and pop music phenomenon of the 50s and 60s. Acting as a reaction to abstract expressionism, Pop Art emphasisedthe kitschy elements of popular culture. With this art movement, came back the sharp paintwork and representational art and glorified unappreciated objects and ordinary business.

Leading artists:
Richard Hamilton (British, 1922-),
Andy Warhol (American, 1928-1987),
Roy Lichtenstein (American, 1923-1997),
Claes Oldenburg (American, 1929-),
Jasper Johns (American, 1930-), and
Robert Rauschenberg (American, 1925-).

To know more, visit:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pop_art

Sonam+Maliha=SONAMALIHA...friends forever.. :)

Do you know the meaning of a Best Friend??...

well, I don't know, but one thing I know...

I have Maliha...and I know what she means to me, to my life....

my friend..my sista..my family..my guide..my mentor.. she is a friend, a dream come true...

she is the one who listens to every tit-bit of crap I go on and on!!!

with her, I need not to wait for an occasion to celebrate...cause when I'm with her, every moment is an occasion...and every occasion worth a celebration... :)

thankuuu for being with me...

and just to remind you my sweet Maliha,

I always ate your brain, and will continue all my life ;)

love you loads...muahhhh :)

.......

I Believe in You...by Don Williams...amazing song...good to believe in... :)

I don't believe in superstars organic food and

foreign cars I don't believe the price of gold

the certainty of growing old That right is right and left is wrong that north and south

can't get along That east is east and west is west and being firstis always best

But I believe in love I believe in babies

I believe in mom and dad and

I believe in you

I don't believe that heaven waits for only those

who congregate I like to think of God as love

he'sdown below he's up above

He's watchin' people everywhere

he knows who does and doesn't care

And I'm an ordinary man sometimes I wonder who I am

But I believe in love

I believe in music

I believein magic

and I believe in you

Well I know with all my certainty

what's going on with you and me is a good thing

It's true I believe in you

Well I don't believe virginity is as common as it used to be

In working days and sleeping nights

that black is black and white is white

That Superman and Robin Hood are still alivein Hollywood

That gasoline's in short supply

therising cost of gettin' by

But I believe in love

I believe in old folks

I believe in children

and I believe in you

But I believe in love

I believe in babies

I believe in mom and dad

and I believe in you...

designing life...designing dreams... :)

am not glamorous or stunningly beautiful
am not wealthy
am not excessively popular in college
am not hip, trendy or fashion-forward
am what some would consider average
am what some would consider extraordinary
am a Designer, a creator
creating dreams of life
am a multi-tasker, a workaholic
am proud of my heritage, both ethnically & culturally
will go to the ends of the earth for friends and loved ones
will give anyone a fair chance
have been referred to as: wonderful, sweet, talented, naive, warm, hilarious, cute, big-hearted, unselfish, selfish, opinionated, stubborn, and "that jerk"
deny none of the above
enjoy my privacy...enjoy the spotlight
can be simple...can be complicated
am no different than anyone else
am not perfect...am still growing
am in love with my life, my designs
hence am designing life!!