Moving on from DEEZDEN

Mixed Feelings.

Deezden - a spur of the moment blog but surely one that changed everything along the way -  'positively' - and brought beautiful inspirational friends to my life. It will always be very close to my heart with its good and bad and 'you' - each one of you who visited, commented or just enjoyed your time on this link - your being there meant the world to me.

As the title suggests, this will be my final post on Deezden, will be blogging at www.dithitara.com from now on and hope to see you all there.

Huge tight hugs to Deezden and to my fabulous readers, I will be waiting for you at 'light of love' which is the name of the new blog and most importantly, a HUGE thank you for your faith in me and for sharing my journey so far as I hope you will continue to ..... in the new next road!

Featured in POOL

Am so happy to share with you a feature in POOL,

India's first international design magazine:

March 2012 Issue, in their 'Overseas' section,

article titled 'Propagating the Indian Myth'.

This is even more special as POOL is India's first-of-its-kind magazine aimed at 'inspiring via innovative approaches in never-seen-before Design/Innovation/Creativity features' and creating a 'unified platform for creative inspiration without any constraints on discipline or subject'

Read the article on Issuu, pages 28 - 30.

A HUGE thank you to Maitreyi Doshi, Rajlaxmi Datta and the entire team of POOL :)

Charukala Utsav Kolkata 2012 - Last 2 days

Am participating in this Kolkata Art fair.

Dates: 4th - 10th February 2012.

Timings: 3:00 pm to 9:00 pm

Venue:Rabindra Sadan (Nandan)

of 1/1 AJC Bose Road, Kolkata-20.

I am at stall # 32, between Nandan and RabindraSadan buildings.

2 beauties in 4 colours

Following up from my previous post titled 'Cutting the wood,'

here is the final print: woodcut: 4 colour from separate blocks:

hand-drawn, hand-carved, hand-printed.

15 inches x 22 inches on a beautiful Canson paper.

For those of you who missed my Facebook updates,

here are some W-I-P snaps through the process:

Yellow Block

Red block

Prints drying after the first two colours are hand printed......

Third colour - blue - on.....

Final detailing with the last block in beautiful black!

For you reader friends who wait for me to post here on Blogger,

I'd love for you to drop by on my FB page as well,

as I keep posting studio progress updates there.

Thank you

*for walking alongside me through another very special year*

You make me happy!

My prayers, my love and my best wishes with you for 2012!

*hope*light*music*life*love*beauty*

Cutting the wood

Times of India Durgotsav 2011

My Durga Image used by TOI for the second year in a row!

(Newspaper campaign, Delhi, 26th September - 4th October, 2011)

Interview with Culturama

My Bengali Lakshmi from 2009 used for the cover of Culturama (October 2011 issue), India's only free cultural magazine for expatriates that works towards promoting an understanding of Indian culture.

You can read the interview (pg 7) on Issuu.

A big thank you to the entire team of Culturama for this feature.

Linocut Print

This image made a beautiful journey from a pencil layout to the grooves of a block

and finally landed, in bright purple and black, on a deliciously textured archival paper.

The text is a line from a Tagore song:

'Kotobaar bhebechhinu aapona bhuliya'.

I am running way behind my normal blogging pace as printmaking and some

painting assignments are leaving me with hardly any time to post.

To see more photos of my printmaking work from my Printmaking-Guru

Ramendra Nath Kastha's studio, visit my FB page.

None of this would have been possible if it hadn't been for

a wonderful teacher who never fails to inspire.

Thank you readers, for your patience - your visits, (even the quiet ones) mean a lot to Deezden.

Printmaking in Kolkata

I had come to Kolkata for my cousin brother's wedding

in July and we had plans of going back in a month's time.

However, hubby needed to stay back to carry through

a project launch, so I happily obliged. Happily - because that meant

my chance to explore the city and its art scene.

The first thing I did was visit the esteemed GCAC

to find out if there was a suitable creative space that I could work and learn at.

A meeting with the Principal where I could share my work

and express my interest in Printmaking led to something wonderful.

The college has offered me the opportunity to attend its printmaking

department for a month, starting November 2011.

That might happen if I do stay back till December.

The college building is charming with its red walls, beautiful hand painted

murals and huge corridors wrapped in the lush green trees.

The ancient staircases and the decorative walls

are very well maintained and precious artwork adorns the walls

of this building that contains 144 years of history.

I was asked not to take any more photos but I had to share the ones I had.

I explored the possibilities of learning printmaking without having to wait that long

and that led me to my current workspace!

Am training here everyday, my current focus is relief prints.

Here are some image updates from today's work:

This is a 4 colour composition, in red-green.black and white.

Cutting the block of wood is the starting point.

The first set of prints have been taken and then you cut the block again

to prepare it for the second colour.

This is my third print, the first 2 were 2 and 3-colour sets.

It's great fun to cut up a composition on these blocks,

ink them and then take prints manually.

Another student at the studio, cuts his linoleum block

for a 4 colour print. It was my wish to make woodcut

prints for a long time, little did I know that it'll actually happen.

For those of you waiting for the Durga Puja photos (I have too many!),

I have created another blog for these and I'll be posting

all my captures (image n videos) there.

You can start following to get updates as and when the posts are made.

Image updates from Kolkata :I: Mahalaya & Tarpan

That time of the year again,when Kolkata feels insanely alive.

Maa Durga has come to town, the city is on a hyper drive

with last minute shopping being finished on one side and

pandal construction + Goddess installations on the other.

Both spectacular. Both maddening.

Mahalaya is the day which heralds the beginning of the festival.

A day that every Bengali starts with the radio telecast of

Birendra Krishna Bhadra's Mahishasur Mardini.

A day when thousands of Hindus take a dip in Maa Ganga

and pay respect to the departed ancestors with food offerings - tarpan.

Here are some images from the ghats.

The priests play a very important role and wait at the steps

of the ghats, take each and every one up to the river,

chant prayers and guide the offering process.

The little boys and girls, some of who are probably not even very sure

what this is all about, just soak in the glory of the ambiance

and enjoy the dip in the waters!

Street musicians from rural Bengal play at the banks,

kirtans or devotional songs, mostly praising Lord Krishna.

A young priest who held hands and prayed for many that morning.

The beautiful green soil of the river came up to the banks

and before every offering is made, the priest puts a

little bit of the holy soil on the foreheads on the worshipers.

While the river banks woke up to offerings of tarpan,

the rest of the city witnessed the homecoming, literally,

huge idols of the Goddess being lifted and carried to

what will be her home for the next 10 days.

I am hoping to take and post puja photos from Kolkata

as a series, so stay tuned. Shubho Mahalaya and happy pujas to all.