Making Air Visible
By Prenita Dutt
Imagine that you are invited for tea. You are also given an array of cups to choose from.
Their colors range from a warm cream to different shades of brown. The darkest being the color of Mahogany, like glistening piano keys or the bark of a tree after its been drenched by monsoon rain.
On the inner rim, your finger would run over a fine stencil mark reading DEL 10 or RTM 25. You might appreciate how elegant it looks and check the base out of curiosity. Quite like what you do for Yera glassware or maybe Noritake crockery.
You’ll find SMOGWARE embossed there.
It is then that you would understand that the glaze that so enchanted you with its color is actually made from fine smog dust harvested from different cities like Delhi (DEL) and Rotterdam (RTM).
The number next to it, 10 or 25, signifies the time period in years. It helps to calculate the quantity of fine dust that will be inhaled by one human in that period of time. The same weight of dust is then made into a glaze to make it a tangible, albeit shocking, reality on the teacup.
We had gathered at the Naveen Chhaya Pottery Studio in Ghitorni to attend a Smogware workshop.
Smogware is the brainchild of Architect Iris de Kievith and designer Annemarie Piscaer. Who, disturbed by the rising level of air pollution, found a way to harvest the dust that resides openly in cities and to use it for ceramic glazing of tableware. The process is conducted meticulously and the Smogware thus created is safe to eat and drink from.
More can be read about it at www.smogware.org
For this workshop, Iris was accompanied by Fiona (www.cascoland.com) and Saskia.
We wore rubber gloves, face masks and bright yellow jackets. Then went into the lanes of Ghitorni to collect powdery dust with a brush. Carefully placing our findings in a zip lock bag. Colorful laundry hung in interesting patterns and energetic stray dogs greeted our strange presence around their homes.
Some residents were curious as well. One of them, an elderly, frail lady spoke about how dirty her gate looked. When we proceeded to rid it of dust, she seemed visibly happy. She even called out to her neighbor to get her gate cleaned as well!
Once back in the pottery studio we were given various mediums to make the finely sieved dust into a liquid consistency by mixing either water or transparent glaze in a fixed proportion before the pieces would be fired in the kiln.
We could paint whatever we wanted on the card-sized tiles that were handed to us. Everybody chatted as they went about making their glaze. Some wanted minimum dilution of the smog dust they had collected, still others wanted a range of possible tones on their tile. This could be achieved by tweaking the proportions of dust to transparent glaze ratio.
We wrote our names at the back of the tiles and arranged them attractively on a wooden table to dry. Every work was created differently. The resultant Smogware would be ready for display at the Indian Ceramics Triennale, New Delhi from 19th Jan onwards. (www.indianceramicstriennale.com)
I made pomegranate fruit on my tile. I chose this because it is one of the most compact reminders of nature’s abundance. However, instead of a vibrant red, it is painted a dark gray. It reminds me of a foggy day, where one person cannot see the other walking just a few steps ahead. On those days the only thing that connects us is the air that we breathe.
This workshop is designed to be used as a tool for raising awareness about air pollution. It is designed to bring people together in different cities with one common and universal objective.
‘We all breathe the same air.
We all cherish our children’s future.
And we are all mortal.’
This quote of John F. Kennedy from a commencement address in 1963, holds truer now than ever before.
*Indian Ceramics Triennale, at Arthshila, Okhla Industrial Area, New Delhi from the 19th of January till 31st March 2024
Indian Saffron.. by prenita dutt 