Unique and beautiful! Odisha artist brings metal to life with realistic replicas fish art, watch

Berhampur: Pradeep Kumar Maharana of Belaguntha in Ganjam district, works on brass for hours to make replica of fish from it. His works are so unique and beautiful that they look alike live fish and thus it is called flexible brass fish.

According to Pradeep Maharana, it is for ages and generation to generation the residents of Belaguntha have been making the hand-crafted brass fishes which even won the hearts of Bhanja king. The King was so impressed with the brass crafts that he donated 60 acres of land to Bhikari Maharana, who was felicitated with the ‘Bindhani Ratna,’ Pradeep said.

We work for 18-19 hours a day to get two completely finished products; he said adding that it is the only means of his sources of income which is why artisans like him face financial problems as the amount of effort and time they devote does not justify the price it gets.

However, such flexible brass fish are also being sold in cities like Mumbai, Delhi and Bangalore. Even the foreign tourists especially who come from England, America, Africa and Indonesia get fascinated with the flexible brass fish, the value of which is decided by the inches. Currently, the price of one inch of flexible brass fish is Rs 250.