Khiching Black Marble Arts

Out here in Kerkera, near Karanjia, the air is often filled with the sound of hammers hitting stone. We work with black marble, which is something this part of Mayurbhanj is known for. Our place in Nahaka isn’t a gallery; it’s more of a yard where we keep the big blocks of stone. Working with marble is slow and tiring. You can’t rush it or the stone might crack in the wrong place. We’ve all got dusty hair and grey skin by the end of the shift. Most of what we know was learned from watching the older guys who did this before us. We make statues, decorative pieces, and sometimes just basic slabs for houses. Khiching Black Marble Arts is what we do. Every piece of stone is different, so you never really know what you’re getting until you start carving. It’s honest work, even if it leaves your back aching. We don't have a big office or a computer to track everything. We just write things down in a notebook and focus on the stone in front of us. It’s a quiet life for the most part, except for the clinking of the chisels. People from the nearby villages know where to find us if they need something made. We just stay here in the yard and keep carving away day after day. It takes a lot of patience to do this right, but we have plenty of that here.