Art and craft fairs somehow hold a magnetic attraction for people. On Thursday, even as a handicrafts fair organised by the Pondicherry Crafts Foundation was being set up at the G.R. Thirumana Maligai on Mambakkam Road in Medavakkam, visitors started buying the articles, barely displayed.
Friends and neighbours Porkodi Vetriselvan and C. Meenakshi from Bell Nagar walked in to see the items on display.
“I am impressed by the terracotta horses. They will make great decorative pieces for my drawing room. I also want to pick up some junk jewellery for my daughter,” says Meenakshi.
As Vetriselvan says, friends usually have a budget of Rs.500 to Rs.1,000 for such exhibitions and pick and choose what they want to buy. “We keep changing the decorative items in the drawing room. There is enough storage space in our homes. The ceramic ware collection here is quite good,” she adds.
The exhibition, which was inaugurated on Thursday by P. Mallikarjunaiah, Regional Director, office of the Development Commissioner of Handicrafts, has 42 craft persons from Puducherry and Tamil Nadu displaying their crafts.
The items on sale include terracotta, stone carvings, sea shell crafts, wooden items, leather purses, artificial jewellery, cotton saris and jute items.
The exhibition is on till August 17. On Saturday and Sunday, painting, pottery, clay-modelling, art out of waste and terracotta making will be taught for children for free. V.K. Munusamy, founder of the Foundation and who has won national award five times, said that on the previous occasion, artisans were very happy with the response.
“The Foundation is working for the welfare of artisans and it was through our efforts that terracotta and papier mache got GIS marking,” he added.
