An art that bestows happiness

 Yes, Happiness, friendship, loyalty and love. The Japanese Temari ball was a traditional folk art form that originated in China and was brought to Japan five to six hundred years ago. As most traditional art forms, the temari ball was made using scraps of old fabric (mostly from kimonos) that were wound tightly together. Nothing of the old fabric went to waste. Thread was drawn out from the fabric before the ball was made and later used to stitch the wound fabric tightly together and then to form patterns. The same fabric was now being put to different uses in making one art object.

The beauty of this art form lies in its lack of limitations. It is traditional but does not follow the rules of traditional embroidery. The thread is used to usually form geometric patterns sometimes creating a puzzle through the nimble fingers of the crafts person. Since, this art form is also highly personal the temari ball is made primarily as a gift to a loved one.

Today’s Temari artists use a Styrofoam base or a wooden bead as a base for the Temari ball. Yarn is then wound tightly round this base; this is the important part as it helps bring in the bounce that a Temari ball is expected to have. After this, sewing thread is wrapped around the ball carefully to ensure that the ball is in the shape of a sphere and also has a smooth surface. The ball is then divided with relational geometry using a thin paper strip. No definite measurements are made; markings are made on the ball using pins and marking thread. Then the pattern is embroidered or wrapped (sometimes both techniques are used ) using different shades of thread. With Temari there are no certain outcomes – no definite pattern.

Traditionally the balls were made by mothers and grandmothers for their children at play– mostly handball or kickball. With changing times, the temari ball transitioned from a play item to an art object. Today, it is traditional for a mother to gift a temari ball to her daughter for the New year. The gift symbolizes her love and her hope that her child will be brought luck and happiness. It is a gift that she has made with her own hands – shaping the ball while hoping for her child’s future, decorating it while praying for her child’s happiness, adding stitches while nurturing a dream of her child’s greatness.

The Temari knows no limits except for those of its maker. It is an art that is filled with the gentle spirit of the maker and yet it is stronger than the toughest material that one can find. A strength that is derived from the goodness that it is filled with.

Image courtesy: Images from the world wide web