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Writer's pictureLalit Kishore

Understanding Kolam cultural floor art of Indian origin: A line pattern kolam and a micro-video

Kolam is an Indian cultural and traditional floor art or drawing that is drawn at the threshold of various houses by using the following materials.


Drawing materials

  • fine rice flour

  • fine wheat floor

  • chalk

  • chalk powder

  • rock powder

  • synthetic coloured powders




Characteristics

The floor art of Kolam has the following characteristics

  • Free hand simple geometric line drawing considered culturally auspicious decorated with festive symbols

  • Line drawing of geometric shapes decorated with religious motifs, cultural signs and nature's symbols

  • Simple or complex line drawing with curved loops drawn around a dot-grid or dot-pattern

Drawing surface Water-clean even surface at the threshold of a building

  • Even surface waxed with cow-dung and mud mixture freshly prepared every day

  • Coloured cemented surface created for kolam as a modern variation

Drawing surface is kept damp while drawing kolam so that it can hold to the surface at least for a few hours


Example of Kolam line drawing

Inset micro-video shows a geometric line-drawing based kolam design signifying flame of an earthen lamp




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