Karighor: arts and crafts for rural development

Abstract

Bangladesh is a country rich in culture and native artistic talent. There are many different arts and crafts that have been part of our culture for generations, such as the Jamdani Shari, Nakshi Kantha blankets, sharis and other items, homemade clay pottery with designs, iron utensils, ethnic paintings, pithas, and many more. Artists have been making things for generations but due to lack of exposure they are unable to make their art their full time source of income. As a result a lot of artists are disappearing and changing professions to other more lucrative items. We aim to bridge this gap between exposure of art with the use of an online portal which will help artists in rural areas to showcase their talent and sell their products. We will work with NGO’s and the Government of Bangladesh to provide the services to artists through the local service providers. The Karighor portal categorizes products and helps showcase artists. The fringe benefits is that not only is the profession of arts and native crafts restored, there is also a creation of entrepreneurship for local service providers who want to be part of this system. The objective of this paper is to highlight the problem and provide a solution which can be implemented according to the plan and analysis provided by us.