Anarkali

Happy 2012 and a Dream of Mughal Miniatures

noreply@blogger.com (Isabella) — Sun, 01 Jan 2012 14:31:00 +0000

I wish a blissful and happy 2012 full of inspiration and beauty!
If you want to be in an oriental fairy tale scroll down the pictures.
And if you want to be a princess for a day - all these beautifu gowns are for sale here and here!
Pictures: Laroyal.

Naarghita: Music from the Heart

noreply@blogger.com (Isabella) — Wed, 21 Dec 2011 09:47:00 +0000

There is nothing new under the sun. No, really.

When couple of years ago a new trend swept through the Oriental dance scene - "Bollywood Dance" - everybody was enchanted by the sweet, romatic songs of Indian cinema and the combination of sparkling costumes and exotic dance movements. But it had already a history.
In the countries of the former Soviet Union (as well as in many Arabic and African countries) Indian films were very popular; they were a somehow "eastern" response to the omnipresent Hollywood cinema, transporting more conservative family values, without nudes, kisses etc.
In this context we encounter Naarghita, a singer and dancer from Romania, whose story still sparkle somehow like a fairy tale.
Maria Amarghioalei was born January 14, 1939, in the village of Pufeşti, in Romania. When she was three her parents separated and her mother moved to Bucharest, while she stayed with her grandparents until she was nine when she followed her mother to the capital. There she studies classical dance and singing and enters a corps de ballet. In 1956 she watches the movie "The Vagabond" ("Awaara" - 1951) by Raj Kapoor and falls in love with Indian music and dance. She learns the songs by ear and has her debut in 1957 with the song "Chand" ("Moon") from this film which is accepted enthousiastically by the audience.
Then she starts deepening her knowledge on Indian culture studying Hindi for severy years and a professor from the Bucharest university procures her a saree and the scores of Indian songs.

(please note the typical "Bollywood" handgestures on the pictures!)

Narghita experienced true celebrity and brilliance in the 60s and 70s. Throughout her career, she gave concerts around the world: England, USA, France, Lebanon, Egypt. Millions applauded her, burning for the romanitic songs from India.

In this video you can clearly see the "Bollywood" moves that also contemporary oriental dancers use:

In 1967, Indira Gandhi noted Narghita her during a visit which he made in Romania and, stunned by the talented artist, took her to India where she met her idol Raj Kapoor. in 1972 she also acts in aBollywood movie.

From 1959 to 1991 she published a dozen of records with Indian songs, then she mysteriously disappears and leaves the trace of a true legend.

Hadeel: Palestinian Crafts as Special Gifts

noreply@blogger.com (Isabella) — Sun, 04 Dec 2011 14:00:00 +0000

As the festivities come nearer I like to browse beautiful gift shops. Here is one of my favourite: Hadeel: fair traded crafts from the West Banks, Gaza and Lebanon.
Palestinian textile art is amazing in its skillfulness; with it's mostly red-on-back stitchings it gets never boring and it provides a wide range of possibilities, from clothing, accessoires, home decor and any kind of elegant gift.
I adore the cushions and the shawls! So pretty and cheerful!

Hadeel is a Fair Trade shop which aims to provide a sustainable source of income for craftspeople working with social enterprises in the West Bank, Gaza, Lebanon, as well as one in the Galilee and another in the Negev. Our work also helps to sustain infrastructures, as many of the producer groups also provide health, education and emergency services in their communities which lack any form of local government which might do this.

Palestinian handcrafts have always been living examples of ethnic art deeply rooted in Palestinian folklore; they have now become a symbol of the people and their striving for a normal way of life with a national identity, in the face of the Israeli occupation of their land. Making beautiful crafts also helps people psychologically to survive during long hours and days when they are not permitted to travel because of Israeli-imposed barriers and restrictions.

This last example is stunning: olive leaves in silver for a wonderful mediterranean feeling as pendant or earrings.

All pictures from Hadeel.

Found via Emel.

Weimar Refugee Women Group: And how to Cook a German Dinner

noreply@blogger.com (Isabella) — Thu, 01 Dec 2011 08:39:00 +0000

The idea had been in my head quite a long time but it was finally realized only a couple of weeks ago: We founded a Women Group in the refugees' hostel.
To be a refugee in Germany is hard. The government provides what is prescibed by the law: accomodation, medical assistance, food and scooling for the kids. This is a lot, right, especially compared to the circumstances that have driven people to leave their homelands, but an essential part is missing: a perspective for the future. Many persons, even whole families have to wait for years, even decades, until their residential status becomes clear. So they are forced to live a life inbetween, without knowing what will happen, if they are allowed to stay or if they will be expelled from one day to the other.
Especially for the women this is very hard. Mostly they come from societies where the family is the most important bond. Alone here in a foreign country the are forced to stay alone in their houses because the net is not there and they are not used to go out for cultural reasons, while their men usually make new acquaintances quite quickly. Mostly the hostels are placed far from the city without a good connection, sometimes even without a decent street lighting (e.g. here), so in winter it is even dangerous to leave home after 4 p.m.
So the idea was born to establish a network in the hostel itself and it is working out nicely, desipe of language barriers and a lot of kids to look after. Recently the first step out has been made: The women group of the "Inner Wheel" invited us to a typical German christmas dinner.

Cooking toghether was really fun! We had duck from the oven, red cabbage and potato dumplings as main course and baked apples for dessert.

We discovered that the most beautiful "Knödel" (potato dumplings) were made from Afghan hands!

Below a snippet from the local newspaper the next day with myself ( not quite deservedly) in the centre.

And finally we all enjoyed the yummy food with the husbands and the kids!

Tahrir: And a Tale of Braveness and Solidarity

noreply@blogger.com (Isabella) — Fri, 25 Nov 2011 07:41:00 +0000

Picture credits: here.

We all have seen them.
People fighting for freedom and a country without oppression from a military govenement.
People risking their lives for a better future for them and their families.
Armed forces the attack protesters.

Images and messages that make us shiver from horror and grieve.
And we know the feeling of shame for doing nothing against it.

And there is this girl behind the lines of battle
who did not leave her friends for her secure homeland.
Who supplied the field hospital with medicines and first aid tools.

The fire burning within you, my dear friend, has shed its light to all of us in this dull times.

Boro: And A Story of White and Blue

noreply@blogger.com (Isabella) — Thu, 10 Nov 2011 14:31:00 +0000

My new passion regarding Japanese (Folk) Art is a technique to recycle and to reuse tattered cloth. The aspect that, in my eyes, makes these pieces for everyday-use so singular is the combination of extremely simple material and the wide range of possibilities experienced in the use of used cloth and simple repeating stitches.

Boro is a Japanese word meaning “tattered rags” and it’s the term frequently used to describe lovingly patched and repaired cotton bedding and clothing.
The frugal Japanese woman repaired the family’s sleeping futon covers and noragi (farm clothing) again and again by “boro” patching fabric scraps over thin areas and holes in the fabric. Adding sashiko sewing to the repair gave greater strength to the material. Today international collectors regard boro textiles as uniquely Japanese and striking examples of a bygone and lost folk craft.

At a time when Japan was struggling to recover from the devastation of the second World War, the Japanese regarded boro textiles with great shame. These utilitarian textiles served as an open reminder of Japan's impoverished past. Now these same textiles are cherished and collected for the stories they tell and the windows they open into Japanese folk culture and history.

Kimonoboy is an online-shop based in Japan which offers an incredible variety of boro and other cloth and garments. All the pics are from there.

Another remarkable site is Srithreads. You can also buy here and you can find a lot of fascination information on Japanes and Indian Textile Art.

Afganistan: And Tales of Daily Life

noreply@blogger.com (Isabella) — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 14:41:00 +0000

Picture by H. Kreutzmann

Today I finally managed to see this wonderful exhibition on Afghanistan in a small but very beautiful museum of natural history in Altenburg, in eastern Thuringia.
The exhibition features three aspects of the daily life from different tribes in different living spaces across the country. You have there the black tent of livestock breeding nomads, a reconstruction of a small house in the oasis of the river Andhkoy, as well as tools and clothes of gypsies who travel between urban settlements.


Picture by Steffen Graupmann

The combination of everyday artefacts and pictures from the sixties and from today was very touching and give a holistic impression of varieties and social changes and their interdependence from narrowing resources, which in Afghanistan is prominently water.
If yo happen to pass through Altenburg until the 30th of October make sure not to miss this exhibition!

Amira: Or Dreaming the Balkans

noreply@blogger.com (Isabella) — Thu, 06 Oct 2011 13:00:00 +0000

Autumn, falling leaves, and time to listen to new music:

The new album of Amira Medunjanin features the tradition of Bosnian romantic songs in modern arrangements. Her angelic voice creeps immediately under your skin, leaving you with a pleasant shiver of melancholy and sweet emotions.

"Sevdah" is not only the most prominent song tradition in Bosnia, but also a certain attidude towards life, read an excellent description of Muhsin Rizvić, Literary Historian:

“The meaning of the word sevdah in the Turkish language denotes amorous yearning and ecstasy of love, and has its origin in the Arabic expression “säwdâ”, which encompasses and specifies the term “black gall”. Namely, ancient Arabic and Greek doctors believed that the black gall, as one of the four basic substances in the human body, affects our emotional life and provokes a melancholic and irritable mood. There from derives the expression in the Greek language “melancholy” with a figurative meaning of the direct projection of its basic meaning: melan hôlos – black gall. Since it is love itself that causes the same mood, in the Turkish language these terms were brought into a close link with the semantic identity, accomplishing a conceptual result of a dual projection of the basic meaning. Linking these two meanings has opened the process of a poetic transfer of symbolic and emotional qualities from one term to another. This resulted in the birth of a new term related to specific lyrical and psychological features.

In our society, the feeling of love expressed by the word “sevdah”, retaining the basic tone of its emotional commitment has got a melancholic notion of the Slavic-Bogomilian transience of space and time. In essence, our sevdah is both, the passionate and painful longing for love, as well as the melancholic and sweet one, the feeling when you are incapable of enduring the pain caused by love, and the pain transforms into the ecstasy of the intoxication of love that compares to the slow process of dying. Pain, because love cannot be fulfilled at that time, sometimes because space and time act as a wall and obstacle to it, sometimes because there are obstacles of individual, social, familial, traditional or simply emotional and psychological nature. Sevdah expresses itself as torture by others and oneself, and the pleasure of whipping deriving from the identification with the yearning and masochistic experience of love despite the awareness of its futility.” (credits here)

Graphic Art goes Ethnic: "Sansparapluie"

noreply@blogger.com (Isabella) — Mon, 08 Aug 2011 10:24:00 +0000

Absolutely stunning artwork found via the beautiful blog inkling prints! Have a look:
Graphic Art mixed with Ethnic handicraft: Handpainted cabinet by Lucas Risé (Sansparapluie) side by side with a Central Asian Suzani wallcarpet.

Abstract painting and handpainted vase: Audacious mixture of bright colours and patterns.

"Lucas Risé was born in 1978 in the city 25 de Mayo, Province of Buenos Aires, Argentina. During his adolescence he painted street signs, his first incursion in painting. He studied Graphic Design in the Design and Urbanism School of the University of Buenos Aires, Argentina. His unique style matured during his travels and experiences in South America, Africa, the United State and Europe. Painting street signs and murals in Buenos Aires since the age of 12, Risé focuses on art that interacts, that transforms from different angles to become a universe of its’ own. His dimensional art has been featured in publications and capitals the world." quoted from here.

The Wedding

noreply@blogger.com (Isabella) — Wed, 22 Jun 2011 16:13:00 +0000

Oh happy day! We were all prepared, waiting for the great moment, watching happy dances...

... the offerings were ready...
... and so were auspicious signs on feet ...
... and hands.
We all partecipated from the depth of our hearts, showering blessings...
... petals and hoorays on the newly-married couple.
Everything, even the most heart-warming ceremony, has to come to and end...
... and leaves us to chat, laugh and socialize where new bonds are being tied.
I wish you all the best for your new life, my dear sister!

Busy Days in Pune

noreply@blogger.com (Isabella) — Mon, 20 Jun 2011 17:56:00 +0000

In those very busy days we enjoyed shopping, driving to the market in those very cosy rikshaws...
... mingling with all those busy ladies...
... neither minding the torrid sun, nor polluted air nor crowded alleys and shops.
Choosing from the brightest colours...
... and all kind of goods.

Where the sacred and the profane are nearly indisdiguishable...

Unforgattable days in Pune, Maharashtra, India.

Wedding Preparations: A Women's Day

noreply@blogger.com (Isabella) — Sun, 12 Jun 2011 07:52:00 +0000

The most important day for a woman needs a lot of preparations!
Concentration...
And even more concentration...

... is needed to accomplish the masterpiece.

But also the laughter...
... and joy!
And of course readymade food! Who wants to cook with mehndi on her hands?
Hungry after a long day...

And the most beautiful hands I ever had!!

India: And a Tale of Beauty

noreply@blogger.com (Isabella) — Fri, 10 Jun 2011 17:53:00 +0000

Everything, yes, everything had it's very own magic...
The offerings...
The altar...
The accurately arranged food...

The most wonderful smiles...

And even the vans, yes, even the vans were beautiful.
Who said, that a traveller never comes back as the same person she was?? Back in Frankfurt Airport they asked me whether I spoke German...

Mehndi....

noreply@blogger.com (Isabella) — Fri, 10 Jun 2011 15:43:00 +0000

...may vanish, but not the memories of an unforgettable trip to India.
My dearest friend got married - in the next days I will share colouful pictures full of joy.
Stay tuned!

Forgotten Treasures: Child's Books from the Soviet Union

noreply@blogger.com (Isabella) — Thu, 14 Apr 2011 07:47:00 +0000

When I feel a little bit blue or simply tired my best medicine is to treasure-hunting in charity shops. A few days ago I was miraculously rewarded with a whole pile of beauty and I picked up half a dozen of very well preserved children's books with fairy tales from the communist times. A lot of translation work from the soviet brother countries has been done in the German Democratic Republic, and not only literature for adults. The illustrations in the children's books are really adorable and mostly inspired by folk art. Don't get me wrong - I am not a nostalgic of communism. But as a complete stranger to the political reality of Socialism - I spend the first half of my life in the western part of Germany - I just pick up some leftovers of a vanishing culture, where Asia was much more near to a part of Europe than it seems to be now.
I love this first example which comes from Bulgaria (German edition Sofia 1989), the tale of the Prince and the Virgin of the Stars. Much of the illustration reminds me of Byzantine art; the depiction of the King, for example is almost a copy of the portrait of the Emperor Niceforos Botaniates (in the middle) from the 11th century.
The prince trying to catch the princess wears Roman armour that belongs to the traditional depiction of St. George. Also the architectural details on the picture can be found on Byzantine icons.
And, of course, folk art is the second source of the book's illustrations with monsters and mythical creatures.
Story: Fani Pejtschewa
Illustrations: Wenelin Walkanow
Published: Sofia, Bulgaria 1986, German translation 1989.
Byzantine icons: here and here.

Pallavi Goenka: Indian Textile Tradition and Innovation

noreply@blogger.com (Isabella) — Tue, 18 Jan 2011 10:03:00 +0000

Pallavi Goenka is a young designer and she presents a fascinating blend of traditional indian textile tradition and innovation.
Her origins are in the colourful region of Rajasthan from where she gets always new inspiration and bright notes for her very special urban outfits.

She works with renowned artisians and craftsmen; this is visible in every single piece of her collection.
Pallavi Goenka is a Fashion Design graduate from SNDT Mumbai,in 1997. At the age of 18, Pallavi's first major step in the world of fashion was her store 'Pals Couture' in Kemps corner, Mumbai. In 2007 she launched her own brand Ktha, a blend of tradition and modernity.
The brand runs into pret, diffusion and couture. Currently, Ktha retails from various boutiques around India, most notably in Mumbai, Kolkatta, and Ahemdabad.

But this is not all: the multi-talented artist Pallavi works also in the field of painting and photography. Her paintings are bright and cheerful, and her photographs show her precise and observing gaze. So I end here with two more impressions and am looking forward to seeing more!

All pictures: Pallavi Goenka.
Log onto the facebook fanpage for more information.

Finally: My New Rajasthani Bangles!

noreply@blogger.com (Isabella) — Thu, 13 Jan 2011 11:32:00 +0000

These cuties arrived some days ago; just in time for my performance of Rajasthani Dance at the Interkulturelles Neujahrsfest in Weimar. Impressions are here; you can see a snippet of my performance at min 13.13) with these bangles.
These are traditional Rajasthani bangles, I purchased them from here. (BTW: I can only recommend indiabazaar. The order was processed very quickly and the bangles arrived nicely packed. Thank you, Ajay! ) Here you have 60 (!!) bangels, actually far too many for my arms, I could put on only 40 of them.
They look more or less like this - but without the golden stripe (these ones on the picture I had borrowed from a dear friend, Lena.)

Snow: and a Praise of Slowness

noreply@blogger.com (Isabella) — Wed, 05 Jan 2011 18:15:00 +0000

I am not the patient kind of girl.

I have too many ideas.

I want too many things.

I want to write a book.

I want to translate Greek poems.

I want to learn Turkish.

I want to develop my dancing skills.

I want to spend more time making art.

I want to take care of my kids.

I want to do yoga.

And then I realize that I am so slow.

Very, very slow.

And I want to cry.

And then I look out of the window

And watch the snowflakes falling

dancing their way through the air

and finally landing on the ground, completely effortless.

Tiny tiny flakes.

Yet the following day everything is covered with a layer of thick, fluffy, candid snow.

And I try to take one action at a time.

Step by step.

And then the next.

This will be my New Year's resolution:

To learn from the snowflakes.

To concentrate on every single tiny step, until I have reached my goal.

Completely effortless.

And what is your New Year's resolution?

Please share your thoughts!

Joy of Dancing: Helene Eriksen or... dancing without an accent

noreply@blogger.com (Isabella) — Tue, 04 Jan 2011 10:40:00 +0000

I should have written about her long ago.
Because everything started when I discoverded her art.
My passion for traditional women dances.

Helene Eriksen is a teacher and choreographer of traditional dances of the Balkans and Islamic Orient with decades of teaching experience.
But - what makes her truly unique is the rendering of every single dance in its own character. She is - it may sound almost impossible - dancing without an accent.

She speaks almost as many languages as she teaches dances and bestows her students with dance technique, musical and cultural information around the manyfold expressions of (mostly) woman dances of the East. Yoga, dance notation and explanations of the costumes make the lessons a rich source of motivation and personal development.
Working with her is true bliss.
Find more information on her classes, workshops and Dance Tours here. Helene has many friends all around the world; so, if she comes to your region, do not miss to pay her a visit.
Picture credits: Helene Eriksen.

Thankful

noreply@blogger.com (Isabella) — Sun, 02 Jan 2011 16:40:00 +0000

Thankful
for Art strepping into my Life
for unexpected Happiness just around the Corner
for Adorable Persons around me

Thankful
for New Lessons taught

Thankful
for Beauty Everywhere

Thank you 2010

Welcome 2011
When all our Wishes
May come True...

Impressions from My Life: What I Love in Winter

noreply@blogger.com (Isabella) — Mon, 13 Dec 2010 10:07:00 +0000

Frost flowers...

Funny bakery...

... and hot tea with christmas cookies!!

Enjoy the season!

Tuzla - and a Tale of Memory

noreply@blogger.com (Isabella) — Sat, 27 Nov 2010 20:16:00 +0000

I didn't go there on purpose. It was a few hour's stop on a long bus ride in 2006. Walking around I noticed construction works all over the place, activities like in a beehive. My head and stomach still numb from a hilarious wedding I looked for a place to sit down. A newly opened fast-food restaurant with young couples holding hands was not exactly the place I was looking for, so I stopped in a simple inn.

When I had nearly finished my coffee the party at the next table invited me friendly to come over, asking where I was from. “Weimar!” exclaimed the gentleman, who seemed to be the most talkative of them. “We adore your culture. Franz List! Brentano! Der Lindenbaum!” and started humming a romantic folk-song. “We are friends here”, he went on pointing to the other men. “He is a doctor, this is the pharmacist. I am a violinist. We have always been friends. This one is Croatian. Most of us are Bosniaks. But we do not have problems.” He must have noticed my puzzled look and went on: “And the woman in the kitchen is a Serb. We speak the same language, we are all the same.”

These words reverberated in my head as I was walking to the bus station. International money had rebuild the city after the destruction. The victims did not express any anger. But I feel guilty. My nation is an offender. In the place where I live the brightest light of culture is intertwined with the utmost darkness. My Bosnian host reminded me of the light. But I cannot forget.

Joy of Dancing: Gudrun Märtins – a German Odissi Dancer

noreply@blogger.com (Isabella) — Fri, 19 Nov 2010 09:52:00 +0000

I had heard about Gudrun Märtins, one of the leading artists of the classical Indian dance form Odissi in the western world, but when I saw her performance a few weeks ago, I was completely smitten. Her entrance on stage, accompanied by the sound of conch shell trumpets, reveales her exquisite features through the opulent make-up. Her face is a perfect oval with a long and slender nose. Her eyebrows form crescent moons decorated with elegant white dots, her lips are full and sensual with a mysterious Mona Lisa smile. But most alluring are her large, luminous eyes, dark and deep enough to drown oneself.

A piece in honor of the ten goddesses reveal the wide range of her art. She strikes dramatic poses with precision and expresses feelings through the most disciplined and economical gestures. Her movements are crisp and practiced with a perfection that needs many years to be reached. In the dance narrative parts and parts of pure dance, intermingled with acrobatic poses, alternate and create a complete masterpiece.

Gudrun Märtins holds a "Master of Arts" degree at Pracheen Kala Kendra University in Bhubaneshwar (India) after a total of 6 years of study in the Guru Shishya System with her teacher Sangeeta Dash in Bhubaneshwar, in the state of Orissa. With increasing proficiency she received the responsibility to teach classes and appeared at performances and festivals in India.

The following day I was lucky also to attend one of her workshops, taught with mastery, precision and a good sense of humor. Check her dates here and if you happen to be somewhere around, don't miss it!

Picture credits here and here.

Chilling sounds: Ô Houria - by Souad Massi

noreply@blogger.com (Isabella) — Mon, 15 Nov 2010 16:02:00 +0000

She is one of my favourite singers: Souad Massi from Algiers. And now she has published a new album, the perfect companion when you have a few precious moments for yourself, when you curl up on your couch with a cup of hot ginger tea and contemplate the raindrops falling from the november clouds.

Soothing melodies to an acoustic guitar and Souads precious voice create a wonderful atmosphere where the soft dialect of the Algerian capital adds some mystical brushstrokes. The songs are located somwhere between folk and blues without being adversed to easily accessible pop music. "Houria" means "freedom" - but who is free? Souad herself who has moved to France in order to pursue her career as an artist, almost unthinkable in the closed society of her homeland? Or is is her music, free from labels like "worldmusic" or "ethnopop"? Or is it her vision for her fellow Algerian women?
In any case I will listen to this disc over and over again as I did with all her previous ones! And so I recommend it also to all my dear readers. Happy november!

Picture credits: here and here.

Wonderful Life

noreply@blogger.com (Isabella) — Sun, 24 Oct 2010 07:39:00 +0000

One exciting week in Thessaloniki... a lot of work during an International Study Week, but also time for other things, e.g. fabric shopping ....

... and girly chit-chat over a cup of coffee ....

... and, of course, the coffee ground had to be read ;-)

... a spiral ... symbol for fertility and growth at the coffee drinker's handle ... how lucky I am ;-) and on the bottom of the cup ... a harp ... stands for harmony and happiness in the house.
Isn't life wonderful?

Coffee pictures: Ana Karaminova