Bharti Pitre and her team of artisans highlight these everyday exchanges through these pieces
How soon will our kids go back to offline learning? As parents debate this on our timelines, Olee Maatee’s School Time figurine is a charming reminder of what we once took for granted: a mother with her son, waiting for the school bus. Olee Maatee, a Pune-based craft studio, has been filling up their Instagram page and fans’ work desks and fridge surfaces with handcrafted collectibles — tiny gunny bags of garlic and onion, a mango crate, kingfisher tableware, rickshaw salt and pepper shakes, a Konkan hamlet even.
Launched in 2019 as a Centre for Rural Entrepreneurship, Development and Research (CREDAR), and a showcase of products handmade in the Konkan, the studio aims to empower artists by training them. The creative head and founder, Bharti Pitre, 58, guides the 15-odd artisans, but does the final painting herself. “I try to imbibe whatever I observe from life in my paper-māché figurines. From a lively exchange in a chawl to a father telling a bedtime story to his son, or a woman about to take a selfie, the familiar moments and images we tend to overlook are my muse,” says the acclaimed paper-māché artist.
Having shown at galleries such as Mumbai’s Jehangir Art Gallery, she is also popular with private collectors. The 15 cm School Time figurine (₹11,500) effectively conveys a mother’s love and protectiveness in terracotta. The bamboo and terracotta used is locally sourced.
Collections like Sahayadris Hues and From Konkan with Love are available onoleemaatee.com; ₹500 to ₹13,500.