How to Talk to Madhubani Artists at The Craft Fairs

Today my mother-in-law, our neighbor and I went to Shilp Utsav Fair in Noida. We do this every year. India's biggest yearly festival Diwali is approaching and so we like to shop some diyas (clay candles), Laxmi and Ganesh tiny sculptures, decorations that say "Shubh Diwali", warm shawls and some Andgra Pradesh suits.

The stuff is amazing and I always wish I had more money and no matter how much money I bring it's always too little. This time I actually thought about avoiding visiting the fair because it makes me feel bad when I cannot buy 10 Kashmiri paper mash boxes each worth 600 rs.

 Exactly the same thing happened with the Madhubani stall. It had a ton of amazing paintings and black and white drawings ranging from 50 to 10.000 rs. The finer the work, the more expensive the painting is. It can be small in size, it can  be black and white but line work is the thing that decides whether the painting will be expensive or not. As my budget was pretty limited, I just bought 6 bookmark size fine paintings. 

The First Painting I Chose. It looks the most antique and has "OM" written on the back. The stall owner said it was made by the descendants of the famous Sati Devi.

A "Sunday Bazar" Greeting Card

There was my mother-in-law's birthday last week and I ended up making a Madhubani inspired painting of Sunday Bazar. If you don't live in India, you might not know what is a Sunday Bazar. Bazar means market and this is a roadside market that keeps traveling from one city area to another all week long. In my place it is always a Sunday Bazar, in the other end of the city it would be Wednesday Bazar or Monday Bazar.

Shopping is a necessity and a pleasure as well. That's the time when my mother-in-law connect the most and have the best time together. Sunday Bazar usually sells fresh fruits and vegetables, plastic buckets, bangles and hair clips. Even if we are lazy and don't feel like going to the Sunday Bazar, we have to because there is  no any other shop around where we could get vegetables that cheap! This is the weekly shopping and it's the most important one.

When making a Madhubani greeting card for my mother-in-law I first thought just to make a miniature one with a couple of elephants and cows but what story could they tell? I decided to make a drawing that would tell a story that would connect us in some way. The vegetable market theme was definitely the best one!

A Greeting Card for My Mother-in-Law