Charcoal Charm

Charcoal instantly stirs an image of a bag of rugged black rocks fed to a small earthen cylindrical oven from the bottom. A stoic motherly woman would be sitting in ghomta, stoking and fanning the embers with a dried palm leaf. Ghomta, for those unfamiliar with the term, is a threadbare saree that lingers lightly on her thin shoulders and crown - a gesture of paying obeisance to elders in a patriarchal society (not necessarily in acquiescence though).

Astronomical advancement in every sphere of life has ushered a sea change in lifestyle and phenomenal progression in social arrangements; thus this image has faded in the folds of time. While her homely ghomta has slid to comely halters and off-shoulders, sophisticated hobs and new fangled cooking equipments have shoved charcoal out of her rustic kitchen shelves. And now, a cursory search of the web fetches a gamut of charcoal products - charcoal for barbecue, list of restaurants offering chaocoal grilled appetising dishes, clothing brand, and lastly a peek into charcoal art for art connoisseurs.

I'm yet to find the cooking enthusiast and the fashion maven in me, and so while fiddling with Google, my attention gravitated to that last bit on charcoal. Not that I'm an art aficionado, yet I find that hobby pretty colourful, creative, and cathartic. Every stroke brings a difference. 

In no time, Amazon delivered at my doorstep a panoply of charcoal art supplies necessary to dabble in this new water of art. A couple of videos on YouTube was all I needed to train my hands on charcoal blocks, pencils, kneadable erasers, and rice paper stumps to conjure up black and white images, transforming mundane art papers to magnificent artworks. And off started my exciting new avenue - a little wobbly and novice-like in the beginning but gradually unfolding to bolder dramatic ones. Glad to share a glimpse of my gallery so far; looking forward to adding more to my newfound "Charcoal Charm".

Picture reference: a model on Zara's website