Craft libraryBlock Printing
Kalamkari ~ THE PEN & THE BLOCK
Where mythology meets textile ~ Kalamkari is India's great narrative art on cloth, telling the stories of gods, heroes, and the natural world through hand-drawn lines and block-printed patterns in a process that can take twenty-three steps to complete.
This essay looks at the history of Indian dyeing. Our own pieces are not coloured with natural dyes.
One
STORIES DRAWN on cloth
The word Kalamkari tells you everything you need to know about its essence. Derived from the Persian words kalam (pen) and kari (work), it means, simply, "pen work" ~ the art of drawing on cloth. Yet this simple definition conceals extraordinary complexity. Kalamkari is a fully developed artistic tradition with its own iconographic conventions, its own palette, its own chemistry, and a production process so intricate that it can involve twenty-three distinct steps.
Kalamkari is, above all, a narrative art. While most Indian block printing traditions produce repeating patterns, Kalamkari tells stories. Its panels and scrolls depict scenes from the great Hindu epics, the Ramayana and the Mahabharata. They illustrate the lives of gods and goddesses ~ Krishna lifting Mount Govardhan, Rama battling Ravana, the cosmic dance of Shiva. They depict the Tree of Life, surrounded by birds, animals, and flowering vines.
In later periods, they incorporated Persian and Mughal motifs ~ cypress trees, paisley forms, hunting scenes ~ reflecting the cross-cultural exchanges that have always characterised Indian art.
23
Steps in the Srikalahasti process
2
Distinct traditions (pen & block)
500+
Years of documented history
Two
TWO traditions ~ ONE NAME
Srikalahasti ~ the pen
The Srikalahasti tradition, named after the temple town in Andhra Pradesh, is the older and more labour-intensive of the two. It is a purely freehand art ~ every line, every colour, every detail is drawn directly onto the cloth by the artist's hand using a pointed bamboo stick or reed pen dipped in natural dyes and mordant solutions. Inseparable from its religious context, the tradition developed in service to the great temples of South India, producing narrative panels, temple hangings, and processional banners illustrating Hindu mythology.
Machilipatnam ~ the block
The Machilipatnam tradition, centred on the port town of Machilipatnam on the coast of Andhra Pradesh, uses carved wooden blocks rather than freehand drawing. As a major port on the Coromandel Coast, Machilipatnam was a centre of the Indian textile export trade from at least the fifteenth century. Its Kalamkari cloth was traded to Persia, the Arab world, Southeast Asia, and eventually to European markets. This commercial orientation influenced both the motifs and the production methods.
Technique comparison
Srikalahasti is entirely hand-drawn with a bamboo pen ~ each piece a unique, one-of-a-kind artwork. Machilipatnam uses carved wooden blocks for primary patterns, allowing consistent repetition across lengths of fabric. Srikalahasti focuses on Hindu mythological narratives; Machilipatnam features broader motifs including Persian-influenced florals and paisleys.
Historical context
Srikalahasti developed in the context of South Indian temple culture, serving religious and ceremonial functions. Machilipatnam developed as a trade craft, driven by demand from Persian, Arab, Southeast Asian, and European merchants. Both traditions historically used natural dyes and mordants, drawing from the same palette of alizarin red, indigo blue, iron black, and myrobalan yellow.
Every line drawn is an offering. The cloth is the temple, and the story is the prayer.
Three
THE twenty-three STEPS
Preparation (steps 1-5): The cotton cloth is treated with cow dung and bleach to soften it. It is then soaked in a mixture of myrobalan (Terminalia chebula) and water ~ rich in tannins, serving as a base mordant. The treated cloth is dried, potentially repeated, then smoothed and stretched for drawing.
Drawing and outlining (steps 6-10): The artist sketches the composition in charcoal, then begins permanent outlining using a kalam pen dipped in a solution of iron filings, jaggery, and water ~ a black mordant that becomes the defining lines. This stage requires absolute confidence, as there is no way to erase or correct once the mordant is applied.
Mordanting and colouring (steps 11-18): Alum mordant is applied to areas that will become red, using the kalam pen. The cloth is immersed in alizarin (from madder or chay root), producing red on alum and fixing black outlines. Resist paste is applied, then the cloth enters an indigo vat for blue tones. Each colour requires its own mordant application, dyeing, and washing cycle.
Finishing (steps 19-23): The resist is washed away, the cloth is sun-bleached to brighten whites, and final colour adjustments are made. The artist may add final details and highlights using the kalam. The finished piece is washed a final time and dried.
Did you know?
The multi-step Kalamkari process is not complexity for its own sake. Each stage serves a chemical function ~ mordanting ensures colour permanence, sequential dyeing prevents colours from contaminating each other, and the alternation of wet and dry stages allows for the precision required in a freehand medium. The twenty-three steps represent centuries of accumulated knowledge about how to make colour adhere to cloth permanently and beautifully.
Four
KALAMKARI AND the world
Kalamkari textiles were among the most sought-after trade goods in the pre-modern world. From at least the fifteenth century, Machilipatnam's cloth was exported to Persia, the Mughal courts, Southeast Asia, and eventually to Europe via Portuguese, Dutch, and English trading companies.
The European appetite for Indian painted and printed cloth was so voracious that it provoked trade wars and import bans. The famous chintz that swept through European fashion was, in large part, a response to the beauty and colourfast quality of Indian Kalamkari.
Read About the Chintz Trade
Kalamkari tells stories ~ its panels and scrolls depict scenes from the great Hindu epics.
Five
THE modern MOMENT
Like many Indian textile traditions, Kalamkari experienced severe decline during the colonial period. The Srikalahasti tradition suffered as traditional temple patronage structures weakened. The Machilipatnam tradition was undercut by machine-printed imitations.
Revival efforts, supported by government agencies, craft organisations, and individual champions, have stabilised both traditions, though the number of practitioners ~ particularly of the more demanding Srikalahasti style ~ remains small. Contemporary Kalamkari artists navigate a creative tension between preserving traditional techniques and finding new applications and audiences.
The integration of Kalamkari into contemporary fashion has been one of the more successful examples of traditional craft meeting modern design. Indian fashion designers have embraced Kalamkari's rich visual vocabulary, applying its motifs to saris, kurtas, dresses, and accessories that bring the tradition to a new generation. When done thoughtfully ~ with respect for the craft's origins and fair compensation for practitioners ~ this represents a genuine path forward.
Six
THE PEN has not CHANGED
The pen has not changed. The cloth has not changed. The dyes are the same ones used by my ancestors. What has changed is the world that receives the work ~ and perhaps, in changing, it has come to appreciate what was always there.
~ A Kalamkari master artist
Cloth can be more than a covering. It can be a canvas, a narrative, a prayer.
Seven
KALAMKARI and the LIVING THREAD
There is something deeply moving about a textile tradition that began as an act of devotion ~ drawing sacred stories on cloth for the walls of temples ~ and that continues, centuries later, to produce work of extraordinary beauty and technical accomplishment. Kalamkari reminds us that cloth can be more than a covering. It can be a canvas, a narrative, a prayer, a record of cultural exchange across continents and centuries.
Whether created by the patient freehand strokes of a Srikalahasti artist or the rhythmic block impressions of a Machilipatnam printer, every piece of Kalamkari cloth carries within it a story ~ not just the mythological narrative depicted on its surface, but the deeper story of a craft tradition that has survived colonial disruption, economic marginalisation, and the relentless pressure of industrial production. That it survives at all is remarkable. That it continues to evolve and find new audiences is a testament to the enduring human need for beauty that is made slowly, by hand, with meaning.
Written by the Daughters of India team
