A great new painting surface: STONES!

I could have never imagined that stones would be such a brilliant surface on which to paint. While working with Street Smart (a Dehradun-based NGO that works with marginalized children through education and art), we had once set up a stall at a school-fair. I remembered the night before the fair that we had nothing to decorate our stall with, and I had then painted some stones that I picked up from the road outside my house.

It turned out incredibly beautiful but even more surprising was how the visitors at the fair wanted to buy those few stones! Some of them bought extra stuff (we had displayed paintings of children, notebooks, cards and ceramic jewellery) only so that they could get one of the painted mini-boulders!

There are so many things I love about my new canvasses. They inspire natural landscapes and it is incredible to be able to paint a tree, flower valleys or other miniature sceneries on the rough/smooth surface.



Stones look great- whether in your room or on your desk. I have decorated some of these painted stones on one corner of my room along the wall and they add an astonishing amount of much colour and life.

One of my aunts travels a lot with her family and she recently shared how they collect a stone from any beach-town they visit. Once back home, they inscribe the date of their journey and the place they picked the stone from. Wonderful idea and it inspired me to paint on a few tiny button-like stones on the theme of my hometown Dehradun. Here is one:





But know the best part about painting on stones? The next time I run out of stones, I will go visiting rover streams around Dehradun and with any luck maybe even camp out with a few friends. Spend some quiet, quality time and pick up many stones before heading back to inconvenient civilization! Now that's what a job should be like!

And since they are not, let's create 'em for ourselves!