When you enter Craft Museum Delhi; from a short narrow, slightly dark passage you’d be welcome by primeval effigies of warrior era. On the left you will find gallery of art pieces and books along with an eatery.When walk past that you will see wall painted with royal elephants fighting and horses behind them with marquise and royalties perch on them.
Take right
to explore more
of museum the
first gallery you’ll
see would be
Bhuta sculpture. These
are the sculpture
of Shiva’s Ganas
made three hundred
years ago to
cast away evil
like-draught, flood and
other calamities from
villages in southern
region of India.
Although they are
deities but you
may not get
that shrine worshipping
aura there.
Picture clicking
is allowed inside
any gallery of
the museum with
prior permission only. You will not get
any cicerone to entertain you
with galore of
interesting knowledge about
the backdrops of mesmerizing art
and culture of
this nation. You
have to excavate
that on your
own if you
really have gland
that effuse affection
for art. Nevertheless you
may find one
official of the
museum in each
gallery who would
stop you in
beginning seeing cameras
in your hand
from taking pictures.
Each gallery
has wall rendering
information about what
has exhibited. On
asking what does
those official know
about it they’d
tell you the
same.
Past the
gallery of Bhuta
sculpture, through the
thatched corridor and
quadrangle of purple
leaves you’d see
Audio Visual Room.
They will run a
short movie of
endeavour on exploring
splendid art form
of our country.
Movie reveals that
how enrich our
country is with
beatific art forms
that are created
by village people
at faraway lands.
Those people
may not know
how to pose
intellectual with glass
of drink in
exuberant galleries. But
they certainly know
that they have
to continue making
art form in
order to keep
them alive for
generations to come.
However their livelihood
is not implicitly
dependent on it
for making of
art gives them
puny. Nor they
know to how market their
art at elite
level to make
plenty out of it.
That art
form that I
happen to see
was Ponchu Cups
which were not
at the display
anywhere in the
museum.
Doors of
engraved art tells
you that our
heritage belongs to
those who had
exert their talent
in tactile art
forms than in
gossiping on whatsApp.
Wooden Chariot
is from Maharashtra.
It is ceremonial
chariot of Lord
Rama used for
holy processions; pulled
by devotees with
tied ropes in
iron rings on the front
and back of
it. This is
Lord Rama’s Ratha
and one could
see canopy of
carved deities from
all four sides
of it.
Village milieu
imparts serenity that
is not there
in resplendently decorative
lounges. It depicts
how people in
villages live simple
and plain life. Giant Pot
could serve whole
village. Mud houses
of thatched roofs.
Closely built
houses also tells
that people in
Villages live relatively
close alike the
people in towns. Gandhi JI
said that ‘India
lives in villages’.
Sure it does
for the major
part of our
population dwells on rural lands.
Such lands--imbue with
rich heritage culture--lay
faraway. But one could view
all that: Village
Life; Vivid and
varied cultures; Plethora
of Art forms
of India at
Craft Museum Delhi.
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