I missed Flatstock (poster show) in San Francisco last weekend, but made up for it by finding the Indian equivalent. In the Haus Kauz area of Delhi, I came across a gallery show in which a number of people were showing their wares in the form of these really intricate West Bengali hand-painted “Patua” paintings. Tradionally these Patua artists travel town-to-town, house-to-house, unraveling these paintings (which alot of times come as huge scrolls) as a form of storytelling entertainment. The painting tells stories either symbolically or sequentially like a giant comic strip and are often accompanied by a song. One woman kept breaking into a new song everytime i picked up a new print while leafing through them… which prompted me to awkwadly smile and leave quickly.
Unfortunetly it was pretty dark in the spot so taking pictures was pretty hard but it was pretty big with like 10 artists or so. I found a painting of 2 planes with maniacally smiling faces on the front flying toward the Twin Towers as Bush & Bin Laden talked on the phone below which someone bought before i could take a picture of it. I did buy some paintings from this guy,.. who for the life of me i can’t remember his name. Nice guy though.
(UPDATE - found small pic of Bin Laden plane.. even though it looks like a turtle):
Sizes ranged from 9′ x 12′ – 18′ x 24′, including scrolls that were at least 12 ft. long. Cool, but where the hell you hang that. Prices were all over the place.. $8 - $140. In India haggling with prices is standard,… but in the end, you gotta respect the art and time in a hand-done piece.
(Click on piece for detailed pic.)
