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Exploring Pottery in Dharavi's Kumbharwada

This document summarizes the author's experience working with a potter in Dharavi, Mumbai as part of an apprenticeship project. The project lasted 5 weeks where the author spent 7-9 hours daily at Kumbharwada, an area within Dharavi home to 5000 potter families, working under a potter named Bharat Tank. The author learned basic pottery throwing and experimentation, as well as gaining an understanding of the potters' lives and skills. More importantly, the author learned that designers should work with communities rather than make them work under them, and promote local art traditions so they can adapt to trends while maintaining their roots.

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Rohan Z
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95 views12 pages

Exploring Pottery in Dharavi's Kumbharwada

This document summarizes the author's experience working with a potter in Dharavi, Mumbai as part of an apprenticeship project. The project lasted 5 weeks where the author spent 7-9 hours daily at Kumbharwada, an area within Dharavi home to 5000 potter families, working under a potter named Bharat Tank. The author learned basic pottery throwing and experimentation, as well as gaining an understanding of the potters' lives and skills. More importantly, the author learned that designers should work with communities rather than make them work under them, and promote local art traditions so they can adapt to trends while maintaining their roots.

Uploaded by

Rohan Z
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd

Down to Earth

Down To Earth is a personal intiative i took up as my apprenticeship project in my first year in design
,which was to work with a kumbar . the project lasted for 5 weeks where i spent seven to nine hours every-
day at kumbharwada , under a potter, Bharat Tank .
the project aimed at understanding the life of a ‘low skilled’ labout
i aimed at working with a potter as it has been around since start and has a lot of scope, stories attached to
it which may soon be forgotten.following are the pictures recorded on the last week.
on speaking with an experienced designer in the field ,i learnt that one should avoid looking like an outsider
if it wants to understand the people and must take part activley as a member of the community which they
are studying.

what I learnt :
More than just empathising , It is more essential for designers to Work WITH them rather than making
themwork under you , and promote the local art which can go much further and be combined into industry
such that they can adapt to the trends and still be true to their roots.

- Skill : i learnt basic throwing andexperimenting with a few new designs .


About Kumbharwada
About Dharavi

Dharavi is a locality in Mumbai, Maharashtra, India. Its slum is one of the largest in the world, home to Dharavi, in Mumbai is home to 5000 potter families; they live in an area called Kumbharwada, spread across
between roughly 700,000 to about 1 million people,Dharavi is currently the second-largest slum in the 13 acres. Just over 10% continue to work as potters today. Many are 6th or 7th generation potters, whose
continent of Asia and the third-largest slum in the world. With an area of just over 2.1 square kilome- ancestors (Kutchi/ Gujarati) migrated here between 1935 and 40.
tres (0.81 sq mi) and a population density of over 277,136/km2 (717,780/sq mi), Dharavi is also one of Kumbharwada's highly skilled potters make different items of pottery, which are sold seasonally. In this film,
the most densely populated areas on Earth. Dharavi has an active informal economy in which numerous they talk about techniques and troubles of their trade, and urban living, even though they openly long to
household enterprises employ many of the slum residents , leather, textiles and pottery products are move back to Kutch. Some day. Their links with the villages are alive and ongoing. The community's brides
among the goods made inside Dharavi. The total annual turnover has been estimated at over US$1 bil- still come from back home in Kutch.
lion.
irony is that the
white pots are
made from black
clay , which loses
colour on heating
to a certain high
temparature
vessels are kept for firing
as early as 7:30 , this
gives them a good start
as the outer atmosphere
is cold , giving it a slow
start therefore avoiding
cracks.
Sundrying the vessels
before entering the
furnace is necesary to
avoid cracks due to
sudden pressure and
heat.
Wasted vessels are usually kept as a
booking or area reference to identity.
this belonged to a potter from sau-
rashtra who had three more batch-
es to be fired on the same day. This
is coordinated very amoothly as the
people understand the job and it
goes without saying that who need
the furnace the most on that day.
children
here

the children of the locals


are not allowed to mingle
with the large amount of
tourists , art students vis-
iting the area due to influ-
ences of modernism .
at a very young age they
learn about regionalism ,
division of classes . though
they always seem to liven
up when a camera is point-
ed at them,
A water bottle (small) inspired from a Camel

Left : A wine bottle i made from red clay under bharat bhai’s guidance inspired
from portugese and french pottery
kiss glass made from red clay , inspired from
the feeling of sipping the first tea for the day.
kone galss , inspired from a triangle

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