Arts and crafts of a village, city, country make up for the ‘rooh’ (soul) of the cultural heritage of the place and Goodwill Project helps in preserving them. They give a chance for people to connect with one another and to a greater sense of self and awareness of the environment around them. They teach people to experience the world for what it is and much more than that. It makes people ‘feel’ the world around them and understand that there is a higher sense of existence.
Every region has unique art forms that communicate generations worth of stories about that community, its culture, its history, its reasons. These need to be preserved simply so that humanity can be preserved. The communities that are still creating and keeping these lost art forms alive, need to be preserved. We strongly believe that only funding the communities is not going to help. We initiate Goodwill Project which helps in preserving lost art forms and helping the villagers. The idea behind the Goodwill Project is simple. We help in connecting dots and helping rural artists to connect with art lovers like you and enable you to buy from them directly through the Goodwill Project!
We are creating an ecosystem that organically funds them and spreads the knowledge and joy of creating the art form among many. Book A Workshop now has a platform for these lost arts and crafts of India and their artists!
We will be creating the ecosystem in the following way:
- Workshop In A Box: This will be a kit lead workshop experience where a box with all the material needed will be delivered to your doorstep and a recording of a step-by-step tutorial of the artist from the village will be provided. All the proceeds from the box will go to supporting the artist and their community.
- Product Sale: The artwork that they make will be listed with us and can be bought and shipped online. All the proceeds will be given to the artist who makes the artwork. This will help them go online and reach a much wider audience.
As the famous saying goes,” Give a man a fish, you can feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.”
This ecosystem will not only help spread the art form but also help them earn their livelihood, with their art and integrity intact.
Warli is one of the lost art forms. Warli painting is one of the oldest forms of Indian folk art. It originated in the warli region of Maharashtra. This is a unique style of painting made by tribals on walls on special occasions. The uniqueness of Warli paintings is that they have always been drawn using specific geometric shapes such as circles, triangles and squares. Each shape represents a different meaning. The circle and triangle were inspired by their observations of nature, the circle representing the Sun or Moon and the triangles representing mountains or trees.
Warli paintings are traditionally done on mud walls with white paste. This white paste is made of rice, water, and gum. Women were primarily responsible for Warli paintings. The painting’s most significant feature is that it depicts social life rather than mythological characters or images of deities. In their paintings, Warli artists depict unity and their ancestral culture. It is becoming increasingly difficult for this art form to survive. Be a part of the Goodwill Project and help in preserving this art form and many more.
Learn how to create Warli on various surfaces from the last remaining Warli artist from Thanpada, Maharashtra. You can start creating beautiful Warli designs and stories of your own on any surface once you have learned the basics with Nitin Gavit.
