This section of the website, provides through its side-bar menu, main thematic areas of the arts of Nepal (visual, music, performing, literature, etc.), each of which has category subdivisions: for example for ‘Architecture’ comprises Interior Design, Buildings, Bastukala, Vastu Shastra, whilst ‘Literature’ comprises Contemporary Literature in English, Classical Literature, Contemporary Plays, Novels, Short Stories, Non-Fiction, Poetry, Nepali Ghost Stories.
In addition to the thematic areas of Nepali arts (that would apply globally to other countries and peoples in terms of the same areas of creativity), one of the key purposes, both practical information providing and also educational and lobbying based, emphasises that there is a continuum, direct interelationship between the fine arts [performing, musical, visual, etc.] and artisanship.
The Nepali Arts section of the website therefore includes Artisanship, and some major forms that have had for millenia great importance long before the concepts — and division –of ‘the fine arts’and ‘craftsmanship’ was in more recent modern times conceived. The artisanship pages of this section of the website, are likewise arranged into some of the major subdivisions — Textiles, Costumes & Clothes, Woodwork, Metalwork, Culinary Arts & Ware, Statuary & Icons creation, Musical instruments creation.
The thematic sections of the Nepali Arts side-bar links comprise different sections, depending on the form of art or artisanship covered: articles, images, video and audio links, etc. Also included is a page dedicated to providing a range of different links of value to those interested in Nepal’s contemporary arts scene, including to organisations, groups, etc.
In addition one page is included that looks at the differences and similarities between Nepali and Indian Arts: a topic of the greatest importance for all interested in understanding the interconnections between the two, and at the same time informing about the distinct differences of both.
What are the differences between the ‘Arts’ and ‘Artisanship’?
Two: the former is — apart from social activist initiative — commonly the foremost influence in all lands and nations for influencing politico-social change, and the latter has a socio-economic-cultural influence in terms of day to day living and human environments that the arts/fine arts cannot equal.
What unites the Arts and Artisanship?
They have two interconnections. Both are informed at a fundamental level by spiritual and aesthetic inspirations and conditioning influences (the former more abstract/conceptual/impressionist: the latter more utilitarian and commonly informed by given cultural characteristics, such as we see in Mithila fine arts and Mithila craftsmanship), and on the other we find that fine arts practitioners from the earliest times to those of the present, commonly have an inspirational dependency on the creative works of their brothers and sisters, the artisans. Hence we find the subjects — architecture, ceramics, costume, etc. — of visual fine artists creative works paying homage to the work of the artisans that created the subjects they have depicted, not to mention the work of literary giants (Vasari’s Lives of the Artists, some of the Tales of E.T.A. Hoffmann, etc.) that feature the story of the lives of artisans (this as a result of the reverance for the beauty and technical brilliancy of the latters works).
For these reasons the Nepali Arts section of the website is intended to promote awareness of the interconnections between the Arts, and Artisanship. This part of the website is also intended to highlight that both the arts and artisanship have a joint, co-equal, role in furthering international profiling of Nepal as an unequaled epicentre of Asia’s cultural and artistic diversity and richness.