The natural beauty of Kashmir is no doubt an inspiration but Kashmir is globally recognized because of its beautiful arts and crafts. It provides employment to vast segments of craft persons. If anything has given us a global identity, it is our handicrafts it (Kashmir ) is home to the finest art works in the world .As Kashmir is the valley of artisans where many arts have found their roots .one such art which remain an integral part of the valleys culture is the Paper Mache Art. The beautiful art of paper Mache is the heart and soul of Kashmir culture.
The amazing transformation of scrap or waste paper into beautiful artifacts (by the golden hands of artisans) done in decorative beauty to outshine the very essence of colors is what paper Mache is all about. In Kashmir ,paper Mache originated in the form of making pen cases from paper pulp(Base) .the qalamdans(pen cases) were in turn covered with floral or geometric patterns and finished with a coat of Rogan (Varnish ); it was for this reason that the craft was initially referred as Kariqalamdan ( the art of making pen cases) .
The humble journey of making this beautiful paper Mache products involves two processes : Sakhtasaazi ( basic object is made of a light weight material by a different community called saktasazi.,who fashions the base product ) and Naqashi (Painting ) giving decorative touch ,painting by fine hands for intricate designs , done over it .
Products
A wide range of paper-mache items which are widely known for beautiful motifs and designs include :
Wall-plaques and Panels, Mirror-holders, writing table sets, Lamp stands, Boxes (cigar, flat, jewellery cups, trays, frames, elephants, horses, cats, flower vases ,pendant Lamp Shades and so on.
No doubt the art was losing its life. Like other crafts, it had suffered due to it being unorganized with additional constraints of low capital ,poor exposure to newer technologies ,absence of market intelligence and so on.
But the growing online business once again revived such arts and the livelihoods of artisans. amazon.in, kashmirbox.com , craftsandartisans.com, indiamart.com etc are selling kashmiri products and giving new life to them.
