There are spherical 10 bhaskar shipaloys or sculpting workshops in Passe Dhaka’s Shakharibazar. Love the fruit warehouses in Badamtoli or the gold retail outlets in Tatibazar, these are no longer clustered together. Truly, one workshop in all equity a ways-off from the opposite.
While procuring for sculptors who are working for Durga Puja, we learned Anamika Nandy, the very most provocative feminine sculptor in the dwelling, and her mother Sujola Nandy of their runt workshop at the conclude of a narrow alley.
Sujola modified into once sitting beside her daughter on the ground, looking out at her work. She had a wet gamcha wrapped spherical her; she had fair correct reach from the shoshan ghat after cremating her sister.
Anamika modified into once engaged on a small idol of Ganesh. She talked swiftly, but her arms labored faster, and by the conclude of our 15-minute conversation, Ganesh’s bahon, or provider— the mouse, modified into once full.
“I grew up looking out at my father Sushil Nandy work, and he modified into once a good sculptor. When he modified into once alive, I never in actuality labored with clay, but I’d steadily serve him with the colouring or dressing up allotment,” she told us.
Then again, he handed away two and a half years in the past, and since then she has been facing the trade together along with her mother.
Sushil had left an incomplete idol of Mahadev Thakur for Neel Puja. The patron modified into once a local who asked Anamika to full it.
“I modified into once shy in the initiating, but after I accomplished the idol and all individuals acknowledged that it nearly resembled my father’s work, I modified into once motivated to continue sculpting. Making idols is a seasonal work, however the young artist mute needs to continue doing it. After I work, I in actuality feel as if my father is mute with me,” she acknowledged.
Juggling between MBA courses and tutoring kids barely leaves Anamika ample time to engage in sculpting. But mute, she manages to originate at least two orders for Durga Puja.
She is the very most provocative child, and sculpting idols serve with the small family’s finances.
“It is a ways nice me and my daughter now. What she does is inconceivable, caring for our small family all by herself,” acknowledged Sujola.
Amongst the total artists in this dwelling, Haripada Friend is mainly the most senior and likewise basically the most notorious. You place a ask to anybody, a retailer keeper or a laundry proprietor, about Haripada Friend’s retailer, and he’ll come up with the directions.
The take care of to his retailer is barely 52, Shakharibazar. The retailer known as ‘Shimulia Bhaskar Shilpaloy’, which is form of as extinct as Bangladesh, is no longer a retailer in actuality; it’s miles Haripada’s office cum workshop.
Right here, the 75-year-extinct sculptor, and one of basically the most senior artists in Passe Dhaka, works his magic to create one beautiful protima (idol) after yet another.
As Durga Puja has already begun, he is busy from morning till dumb at night. His frail health does no longer enable him to take a pair of orders, so in the intervening time, he simplest works on one expose.
But the idols are reasonably immense in size, and creating the Durga idol together along with her total family takes extra than 15 days.
The afternoon of our meeting, he modified into once engaged on sculpting the tail of the lion that sits advance Durga’s toes. We did no longer get to disturb him or his work, so we silently seen him for a while.
But he smiled at us steadily, signalling with his hand that he would possibly well be free soon, so we must take a seat and wait.
Bare chested and clad in simplest a blue lungi, Haripada’s hair is all white. He walks slowly, but his fingers work all straight away, nearly cherish a machine. In a jiffy, what looked cherish a darkish lump of clay become a long, properly-organized lion’s tail.
“I focal level on I got into sculpting sooner than 1963. I modified into once very young. I reach from a family of sculptors; my father and my grandfather had been all sculptors. I modified into once once a pupil of Bulbul Lalitakala Academy in Wais Ghat,” he told us.
His brother-in-law, Dilip Datta, manages the work orders and purchasers. He acknowledged, “Dada (brother, relating to Haripada) is one of basically the most provocative artists in the country. His pupils would possibly well be learned in every corner of Bangladesh. You should receive his works in cement in mountainous temples in the metropolis. Yearly, he makes the Rokhha Kali idol, and yearly, it’s miles extra beautiful than the earlier one.”
Haripada’s working home in all equity mopish, with a few sad lights on the bluish grey wall. But his work is swish. The idols of Durga’s kids—Lakshmi, Kartik, Ganesh, and Saraswati—had been strewn throughout the room, and in that darkness, they looked eerily and beautifully cherish human beings.
“He modified into once invited to america to work in 2012. No longer simplest in Dhaka, he frail to stir to Mymensingh, Narsingdi, Faridpur, and a lot of other areas to kind idols. But he is a lonely man in the intervening time; his simplest son died final year in December. It is fair correct him and his wife of their dwelling,” acknowledged Dilip.
As we walked spherical Shakharibazar, asking folks about the place we would possibly well receive other sculptors, we met Narayan Friend and Paltan Friend, who had been sitting of their workshop.
The Hindu title ‘Friend’ once belonged to simplest sculptors, noteworthy cherish the ‘Ghosh’ title belonging to dairy farmers or sweet makers. Even now, there are a full bunch Hindu neighbourhoods titled ‘Palpara’ or ‘Ghoshpara’, indicating that once there had been a immense series of sculptors or dairy farmers living there.
The Company we met that day belonged to the identical family, and both had been sculptors for added than 40 years. Paltan modified into once busy engaged on a small idol while Narayan sat beside him with a morose face. They did no longer seem particularly in talking to journalists.
“It would now not in actuality feel cherish puja this year. Veritably we net orders rate five to seven lakhs takas, but this year we got simplest two orders. But there’s nothing we are in a position to produce,” acknowledged Narayan.
Lots of the sculptors or artists in Shakharibazar acknowledged the identical thing: orders had been few as most folks had been unsafe about the puja celebrations.
Moreover, the series of sculpting workshops in Shakharibazar has dwindled over the years. This year, there are barely any signs of celebrations here, because the sculptors work on no extra than two to 3 orders per workshop.
Now we had been to Shakharibazar a lot of occasions on work assignments or fair to buy some powdered shankh (conch) or files of teep (bindi). It is very brilliant sooner than Durga Puja, with the total dwelling bustling with customers from throughout Dhaka. A selection of rainbow-colored puja items decorate the partitions of the stores.
It’ll had been the climate that day, cloudy without a chance of rain, or fair the absence of festivities in Shakharibazar that upset us.
But Anamika looked snug while working, happier than the others. She patiently explained to us how they originate the total course of of making an idol.
First, they devise a framework with wood planks and net the idol shapes with hay. Then, layers of loam and clay are applied on the reach, which finally turns into a out of the ordinary protima.
When she started working, it modified into once no longer very easy for folks to settle for a feminine sculptor, but she obtained plenty of make stronger from senior artists or sculptors cherish Haripada Friend, who labored along with her father.
“I net recent customers who are enthusiastic about the premise of a feminine sculptor, but if truth be told many of the extinct purchasers are from my father’s time,” acknowledged Anamika, at the side of, “I will’t take too many orders anyway since I in actuality get my experiences and tuitions. This puja, I took two orders, but I’m doing them all by myself. If I took on allotment-time helpers, I seemingly would possibly well get taken three orders.”
