Balotra The Complex Language of Print

This is a wonderful book brought out by Anokhi Museum of Hand printing. It gives a historical background of the prints, which community wore which prints and a description of the processes that created the print. There was a wonderful picture of the different turban tieing techniques used by Langhas, Rabari, Maldari, Maali, Gujar and Chaudhurys.

Boriya print is a geometrical block print that is worn as a ghaggra by married Kumhar and Chaudhry women. The pattern on the cloth is similar to the decoration on pots created by the Kumhars.

If the ghaggra's of the women have a large red border at the hem, it means they are married, if the woman is a widow, she does not have a border or a piping on her skirt. As a woman ages her skirt print becomes duller and the motifs simpler, the reds became rusts and the yellows are removed.

Gadia Lohars, itinerant iron workers, wear the bhalka print, which is a bold repeat of a large spear or arrow head motifs. Maalis, a community of gardeners, wear prints that represent flowers or vegetation. Some of the them are phooli, gainda, chameli and neemboli. Mato ro fatiya is a simple design worn by widows and pre construction workers, mato means sand. Babooliya shows the babyul or accacia tree.

Chippa Yusuf Khan and his family in Balotra have kept alive the tradition of block printing for Hindu women, for more than 150 years. The printers use the local dabu mud resist method. The motifs sit on backgrounds dyed in indigo blue or emerald green. Motifs picked out in soft natural reds, rusts, ochres and mustard yellows are achieved through the labor intensive printing of mordant pastes onto the cloth before dyeing.