The first time I set my eyes on an "artistic egg" was sometime ago, to be precise in 2001, when strolling along one of the Angolan capital city streets I fell upon a beautifully decorated ostrich egg (with a wilderness scene painted on it by a South African artist) proudly standing among other artefacts in a well known down-town handicraft shop.
As I was buying it I was told that the oldest eggshells decorated with engraved hatched patterns had precisely been found in South Africa and dated back to 60.000 years.
A few years later whilst travelling through the Czech Republic and Slovakia I saw some quite different ones at an Easter egg Fair and couldn't resist buying a few more, having since then initiated a sporadic collection.
Five of the thirty decorated egg shells I have collected (from Hungary, Poland, Romania and Czech Republic).
According to what I have read the tradition of egg decoration within many Slavic Ethnic groups (Bulgarians, Croats, Czechs, Serbs, Slovaks, Slovenes and Ukrainians) as well as Romanians is said to have originated in Pagan times. They are mostly associated to Easter nowadays.
Many of these eggs are decorated by applying a wax-resist method similar to Batik, others a scratch technique, brush painting, carving and even various appliqué versions glued to their shells.
My fascination for this artistic form is intimately connected to the meticulous work involved, the fragility (and many times) the hardship of the material it is worked but above all the beauty it conveys ...
Having them in boxes ... out of anyone's sight does not diminish their beauty ... there they lie ... to be seen by one who really treasures them ...
I look at them from time to time (like today), as if to remind myself that beauty does exist, whether it is in the eyes of the beholder ...
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