Dev lal Tekam

An artist is born and not made. No one knows this better than two self-taught folk artists of Patangarh village in Dindori district of Madhya Pradesh who have now made Gond art a household name. Meet couple Devlal and Gangotri Tekam who are at present in Ranchi to take part in the ongoing five-day tribal, folk and traditional painting camp at Ram Dayal Munda Kala Bhavan in Hotwar. The duo are busy painting Gond motifs on handmade paper. "Though we use natural colours, here we are using acrylic ones," said the artists. "We had exhibited 25 Gond paintings at the Global village festival in Dubai in 2013. Our work was appreciated by art aficionados," said the couple. Closer home, their art has been exhibited in New Delhi, Mumbai and Bhopal. Friday was the third day of the painting camp where 12 artists have assembled from Bihar, Odisha, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh and Chattisgarh.