Pen or block? Read the label before the pattern

By Porter Lang

Start with a question you can put to any seller: was this painted or printed? Kalamkari covers both. The word itself means “work done with a pen”, Sahapedia says, and refers to painted and block-printed cotton and silk from the Coromandel Coast. Wikipedia describes two styles, one in Srikalahasti and one in Machilipatnam, and both have their own geographical indication.

Style one: Srikalahasti, by hand

Wikipedia says the Srikalahasti style is hand-painted and entirely hand worked, with a kalam, or pen, used for freehand drawing and for filling colour. Sahapedia, a heritage-documentation site, says production is in small family units and gives the sequence of the work. Cotton is washed to remove starch and oils. It is dipped in buffalo milk mixed with myrobalan fruit dust, squeezed and dried. The design is sketched with a charcoal pencil made from burnt tamarind twigs. The outline is drawn with a bamboo pen tipped with cotton, dipped in kasim, which Sahapedia describes as a fermented iron-and-jaggery solution.

Then colour. Alum water goes on the red areas, Sahapedia says, and a little kasim added to it gives maroon. The cloth is dipped in a hot alizarin solution for about 45 minutes and washed in the Swarnamukhi River. Yellow, orange and blue follow, the blue from indigo, with another wash.

Wikipedia gives the same method in outline: a bamboo or date-palm stick with a bundle of fine hair as a brush, dipped in a jaggery and water mixture, with astringents and buffalo milk first. It adds that the whole process has twenty-three steps and that only natural dyes are used. Note what the two accounts do not agree on: Wikipedia names a “mixture” for the pen, Sahapedia names the iron-and-jaggery kasim. They may be describing the same step in different words.

Style two: Machilipatnam, by block

Sahapedia says Machilipatnam’s line drawings are carved into wooden blocks, and production happens in workshops, called karkhanas, where block makers, washers and printers work under one roof. The blocks are teakwood, carved in relief. Outlines are printed first, then the fill, with a separate block for each colour. Black and red are printed, then the cloth is washed and boiled. Alum is not used for the red here. Cloth is boiled in iron vessels over ovens fuelled by rice husk and wood powder, with leaves of the local gaja tree added to fix colour. Yellow and blue are printed and boiled again. Washing is done at the Kalia Canal.

Wikipedia says the Machilipatnam style is also called Pedana kalamkari, and describes its motifs as Persian-influenced: the tree of life, lotus, peacock and parrot. It lists table and bed linen, curtains, scarves, cushion covers and wall hangings as products.

Wikipedia also says that the method has been changing. Mordant is now block-printed, the indigo dyeing and wax resist have been dropped, and iron acetate replaces indigo for the black. Yellow comes from dried myrobalan flowers. So a modern piece may not follow the older sequence in Sahapedia. Ask.

The tags

Wikipedia says Srikalahasti kalamkari was registered as a geographical indication in April 2005 and Machilipatnam kalamkari in April 2008, both from Andhra Pradesh, as handicraft goods under the 1999 Act. A GI says where. It does not say whether a given length of cloth is painted or printed, or dyed naturally. Those are the questions to ask.

Age, and a quarrel

Sahapedia says block-printed cloth from the late Roman period has been found in Egypt and that the oldest surviving Coromandel Coast samples date to the 13th and 14th centuries. Wikipedia says the art evolved about 3,000 years ago, and cites a resist-dyed cloth on a silver vase from Harappa dated c. 2600 BC. Wikipedia itself flags that some of its claims need citations and that its page contains an apparent error about “architecture”. We treat the 3,000-year figure as unconfirmed.

Sahapedia says Machilipatnam was a busy port from the 15th to the 17th centuries, with English, Dutch and French traders in the textile trade, and that its motifs blend local, Persian and European elements. It says preserved examples in museums worldwide point to that trade. Wikipedia says that after the conquest of 1687 the Machilipatnam style added portraits of emperors and court scenes.

The name

Wikipedia gives kalam as “pen” and kari as “craft”, in Persian, and lists several accounts of who named it: the Mughals, or medieval rule more generally, with popularity under the Golconda sultanate. It also lists an older Telugu term, vraata pani, meaning “writing” and “work”. Our reading: the Persian-derived name is the later label stacked on an older practice, but neither source says so.

Dates in order

13th to 14th centuries: oldest surviving Coromandel samples, according to Sahapedia.
15th to 17th centuries: Machilipatnam busy as a port, according to Sahapedia.
1687: conquest, after which court scenes appear, according to Wikipedia.
April 2005: Srikalahasti GI, according to Wikipedia.
April 2008: Machilipatnam GI, according to Wikipedia.

Side by side

Srikalahasti: pen, family units, freehand. Machilipatnam: carved teak blocks, workshops, repeat patterns. Both: cotton, buffalo milk and myrobalan, mordants, alum and natural dyes, in the older accounts. Sahapedia and Wikipedia agree on the two centres and differ on the district names (Chittoor and Tirupati for Srikalahasti), so we use the town names only.

What kind of sources these are

Sahapedia, a non-profit heritage-documentation site, which gave the fullest process; and Wikipedia, whose kalamkari page flags weak citations. We tried a museum page that no longer exists and a newspaper page whose text was missing, and a shop’s blog appeared in search but we did not read it. Two sources is the minimum here and we say so.

Questions a buyer would ask

Painted or printed? Are the colours natural, and is the sequence the older one or the modern one with iron acetate? Which town is named, Srikalahasti or Machilipatnam? We quote no prices.

Quick answers

What does kalamkari mean? Sahapedia says “work done with a pen”, for painted and block-printed cotton and silk from the Coromandel Coast.

What is the difference between Srikalahasti and Machilipatnam kalamkari? Wikipedia and Sahapedia say Srikalahasti is hand-painted with a pen and Machilipatnam is printed with carved wooden blocks.

Do both styles have a GI tag? According to Wikipedia, yes: Srikalahasti in April 2005 and Machilipatnam in April 2008.

What we left out

We left out the epic and temple subject matter, named figures from the twentieth century, the mythology in the older accounts, quantities for the dye recipes, and prices.

Roam first. Shop later.

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