Warps and wefts, crisscross,
Slender rivers of colour flow.
Merging, clashing,
weaving tales that glow.
The Indian or South Asian Subcontinent is a land of vibrant colours, especially regarding clothing and how we incorporate colours into our daily lives. Within this vast geographical area, home to over 2 billion people and roughly a quarter of the world's human population, a diversity of colours is yet to be fully homogenised by mass-produced clothes dyed and dipped in mass-produced chemical colours.
(Trivia: India is the world's second-largest producer of chemical textile dyes after China.)
It is relatively easy for a person from the subcontinent to differentiate between the colours women and men in Rajasthan's desert choose to wear and someone from Bengal. Many of the clothes are still rooted in what is manufactured and woven in the region. The chemicals that colour these clothes lag behind the latest global chemical or colour industry developments and may eventually catch up because they are probably cheaper. Even when the clothes are sourced from far-off places like the manufacturing centres in Bangladesh or Tiruppur in Southern India, people's tastes dictate the colours.
This may not be unique to South Asia, but it can be a fascinating lifelong hobby if you are interested in the colours surrounding us and the people wearing them. And aren't we colourful?
Today's images are from the centre of the Indian peninsula called the Deccan Plateau. They are from an annual congregation at a pilgrimage town called Pandharpur, which attracts devotees, primarily farmers, farm labourers, or people tied to the agrarian rural economy. The soil here is rich black, and the main rivers that drain this North Central region of the Deccan Plateau are the tributaries of the river Krishna—the word for dark or black in Indian languages.
Presenting, the subcontinental colours of North Central Deccan Plateau.
These images were shot in and around Pandharpur, Solapur District, Maharashtra - India.
Stunning photos! ❤️
Amazing photographs!