Narrator: This artist is mixing together a special glue using Araldite and zinc powder. It's one of the ways artists in India have updated the art of parchin kari, or marble inlay, since it was used 400 years ago to decorate the Taj Mahal. Artisans work with such small pieces; they say the strain can damage their eyesight. And the wear and tear on the skin causes them to lose their fingerprints. Narrator: But now this work, which lines the walls of one of the world's most famous buildings, is in danger of disappearing. Today, artists make most of their money selling pieces to tourists visiting the Taj Mahal. But the COVID-19 pandemic weakened tourism and led to a steep decline in marble inlay artists. The job is also not as lucrative as it once was, forcing generations of younger artists to choose different career paths than their ancestors.

We went to Agra in Uttar Pradesh, India, to find out how parchin kari is still standing. Arif Ahmed is a direct descendant of artisans who decorated the Taj Mahal. His family is one of only a few left carrying on the marble inlay tradition in India. Narrator: And that number could be even higher. According to some estimates, the number of marble inlay artisans in Agra has declined by up to 70% over the last two decades. For Arif, this work is a source of pride, and its disappearance would be devastating. He started learning the art of parchin kari from his father when he was just about 10 years old. Narrator: His father, Hafiz Ahmed Khan, was granted the esteemed title of shilp guru by the Indian government and has won national awards for his marble work. Narrator: Today, Arif is using many of the same tools,

methods and materials that his ancestors did, starting with high-quality marble sourced from Makrana, a small city near Jaipur, Rajasthan. It's durable, water-resistant, and has few impurities. It's also high in calcium, which gives it its pure white color. Varun Bansai has been working with Arif for about 15 years. He learned the marble craft from his father and grandfather. This same kind of marble was used to build the walls of the Taj Mahal. Varun and his team quarry raw slabs of marble and cut them using circular saws to separate the clean, usable chunks. Water helps cool the blade and reduce dust while they work. They then mold and carve the marble into tabletops of various shapes and sizes for the artisans. Finally, they deliver the finished marble to showrooms and to artisans like Arif. Today, Arif's team is designing an elephant sculpture made from Makrana marble.

a popular souvenir among tourists visiting the Taj Mahal. Designers first cover the marble in brightly colored water-based acrylic paint, so the patterns they draw stand out better against the white marble. They draw freehand designs directly onto the painted marble with a pencil. The designs can be quite complex, like this one with thousands of flower petals, leaves, and thin vines. The patterns are often inspired by the inlay on the Taj Mahal, which looms over the city of Agra. The Taj Mahal was built between 1631 and 1648 under Mughal Emperor Shah Jahan. The marble was carried in using elephants from Jaipur. To decorate the walls, trained inlay workers were brought in from Persia. A debunked legend held that the shah forced the artisans to have their hands cut off after they were finished, so they couldn't replicate the beauty of the Taj Mahal anywhere else.

Even though no one really lost their hands, Arif says Shah Jahan made sure the secrets of the art were protected in other ways. Narrator: Many of the Persian artisans used their payment to put down roots in Agra, and thanks to their descendants, the city is still today a major producer of parchin kari. A parchin kari artist will eventually fill each of these outlined spaces with a small piece of precious or semiprecious stone, chosen based on its color and aesthetics. While the marble comes from India, the stones are sourced from all over the world, including from Japan, Germany, and Iran. Narrator: Artisans buy these stones from local shops, where they're widely available. The more stones used in the design, the more expensive the final piece will be. Narrator: Arif estimates a table like this would cost about 40,000 rupees, or $480. It also has lights installed beneath it.

to illuminate the finished design. The size of the piece will also affect the price and increase the amount of time it takes to finish. Narrator: The smaller, more detailed work Arif describes as intoxicating work because it requires more time and intense concentration to get right. Narrator: It takes half a day just to make one of these flowers. Narrator: Arif says this work could damage his eyes from the strain if he does it for too many years, but choosing which stone goes where is one of his favorite stages of the creative process. When the designer is satisfied with their rough design, the artist traces it onto a sheet of translucent butter paper. They mark each tiny petal and leaf on the paper like a massive and complex color-by-number, noting which stone will be placed where. Narrator: Then they retrace these shapes directly onto the flat precious stones, with red or blue carbon paper placed in between.

Cutting out these shapes requires a rotating wheel with very sharp diamond-edged blades. Each blade lasts for only about three days. Depending on the hardness of the stone, they could wear out even faster. Narrator: Updated technology like this has sped up the inlay process quite a bit since the days of the Taj Mahal. Narrator: But some artisans like Shafiq Uddin still choose to use the tools of their ancestors, like this hand-operated pulley, even though he owns a motorized blade as well. Narrator: Work like this, however, comes with a lot of physical risks. The cutters use their bare hands and must get dangerously close to the blade to make sure they get an accurate shape. It can also cause a lot of wear and tear on their skin, even eroding their fingerprints permanently. Narrator: They are always breathing in marble dust. And while shaping the stones, they often work with water,

which can numb their fingers in the cold months, when temperatures in the area can drop to around 4 to 8 degrees Celsius. Narrator: Once the stone is cut, another worker will fine-tune the shape and polish it for a smoother edge using an emery wheel. Each cut stone is then lightly glued into the marble. Then artisans scrape an outline around the border to make sure they all fit perfectly. The elephant is heated by the fire so the temporary glue will soften and the stones can be removed to complete the inlay. At this point, they use a variety of pointed metal tools to dig, cut, and scrape out a shallow recess in the marble several millimeters deep. To attach the stones to the marble, the Taj Mahal workers were said to have used a special glue consisting of sugarcane, beeswax, honey, lemon juice, marble dust, and lentils. This type of glue needed to be used right away

and would expire quickly. Today, however, there are many synthetic alternatives that last longer and are easier to make. They mix an adhesive called Araldite with zinc powder and acrylic paint to create a paste. This will harden while the marble is being prepared. When ready for use, they heat the hardened glue with a hot coal so it's malleable and fill the entire gap in the marble. The stones are pressed one by one into the glue in the originally designed inlay pattern. Once the glue dries, they then use different types of sandpaper and polish pads to bring out the shine and smooth the surface. As they work, the pink dye is wiped away, leaving only white marble and brightly colored stonework. Artisans typically sell pieces like this to showrooms or marketplaces, which then resell them to buyers, many of whom are tourists visiting the Taj Mahal. Narrator: The COVID-19 pandemic brought tourism to a halt,

which led to a downturn in the marble inlay business. Narrator: Arif says he hopes the government will one day open its own showroom and buy directly from artisans to help boost their business. Meanwhile, workers put in a lot of time and effort for little profit. But it's not just a decline in tourism that's a threat to the future of the craft. The job is not as lucrative as it once was, so many young people are opting for other fields. Narrator: These days, Arif's son enjoys watching him work, but Arif says he'd never force him to become a parchin kari artist. Others, like Mohammad, don't plan on passing the legacy down to their kids. Narrator: New workers are entering the trade, Arif says, but they are choosing simpler work that requires less training, like creating larger wall pieces or those with less stone. Narrator: And the production of small,

highly detailed pieces, the intoxicating work that's been passed down from generation to generation, is in danger of being lost forever. But their creations will last for years, just as the Taj Mahal has withstood the test of time.

How Descendants Of Taj Mahal Artisans Are Keeping Marble Inlay Work Alive | Still Standing

What you want to know about business. 

Visit our homepage for the top stories of the day: https://www.businessinsider.com 
Business Insider on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/businessinsider
Business Insider on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/insiderbusiness
Business Insider on Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/businessinsider
Business Insider on Snapchat: https://www.snapchat.com/discover/Business_Insider/5319643143
Business Insider on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@businessinsider

If you have a permissions or licensing request, please connect with our partners at PARS International who will be able to provide you with an accurate quote for the overall usage rights that you’re interested in. A representative from PARS will contact you shortly after filling out this request form: https://www.parsintl.com/publications/insider/


How Descendants Of Taj Mahal Artisans Are Keeping Marble Inlay Work Alive | Still Standing

Scripts