Until January 18, 2014, the exhibition India and its Folk Jewelry from the Ganguly and Bir Collections can be viewed in the German Goldsmiths’ House in Hanau.
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- Karnataka
The show presents gold and silver jewelry from 15 Indian states, demonstrating the rich spectrum of differing techniques, design impulses, mythological symbols, and motifs. Around 300 pieces are on display, including elegant bridal jewelry, necklaces, jewelry for the head, hair, forehead and temple, ears, nose, arms, and feet, as well as jewelry for men and amulets.
In India, jewelry belongs in the everyday sphere and is a unifying bond that overcomes all ethnic and religious differences. It is worn not only by people but also decorates idols and animals. The exhibition in the Goldsmiths’ House defines folk jewelry as a contrast to bejeweled urban or court jewelry. Dominant in the towns and villages are finely detailed forms in endless variety that are symbolic and important to the individual person. Jewelry is acquired by men and women for the marriage ceremony, as a protection from illness, or to ward off evil spirits. After the death of the owner it is generally melted down to make new pieces.
The scope of the exhibited works ranges from the jewelry of the north eastern mountain regions, which is often produced from organic and non-precious materials such as wool, glass beads, feathers, or shells, to the especially striking gold jewelry worn in Kerala in the southwest by the Indian Mapilla Muslims.
The exhibition shows jewelry works from Andhra Pradesh, Assam, Arunachal, Nagaland, West-Bengal, Gujarat, Himachal Pradesh, Karnataka, Kashmir, Kerala, Madhya Pradesh, Odisha (Orissa until 2011), Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, and Uttar Pradesh.
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- Tamil Nadu
After the exhibition “Tradition and Modern Times – Evolution of Oriental Folk Jewelry” (2009) this is the second exhibition in the German Goldsmiths’ House of jewelry from the Ganguly and the Bir Collections. While the emphasis in 2009 was on pieces from the Bir Collection, this time the works from the Ganguly Collection are given prominence.
Since 1995, Dr. Waltraud Ganguly and her husband, who came from India, have undertaken 15 scientific expeditions through the subcontinent. The two of them have traveled a total of about 40,000 kilometers. Waltraud Ganguly collects traditional, handmade jewelry that is decidedly different in design from machine-produced standardized designs. It is her special concern to preserve the knowledge of folk jewelry for the young generation of Indians.
The Bir Collection, gathered by the German/Turkish doctor Ümit Bir between 1960 and 2001 on countless trips, includes more than 3000 pieces of jewelry and is thus one of the largest private collections of oriental jewelry. Since 2004, it has been situated in the Ethnological Museum in Leipzig.
