Print This Page

Folk art

Being an island absorbed in farm work and fishing, Graciosa's handicraft output is concentrated on agricultural implements that often repeat ancestral models that deserve to appear in ethnographic museums: ploughs and yokes, harrows and rudimentary fishing tackle. The existence of clay deposits allowed a ceramics tradition which, in picturesque potteries, produced pieces for daily use and vases, tea-pots and mugs of elegant design. The regional guitar, which enlivens every Azorean balho or dance with its characteristic sound, is produced on the island by skilful craftsmen who transform the wood into sonorous and delicately decorated instruments.