Sowing Peace: My Journey with MarketPlace Handwork of India

When I look back on the earliest days of MarketPlace: Handwork of India, gratitude rises to the surface. I was there at the beginning, a founding board member, watching my two determined and creative sisters, Pushpika Freitas and Lalita Monteiro, build something extraordinary. With little more than vision and persistence, they started an organization that used needlecrafts as a lifeline—offering low-income women independence, dignity, and the possibility of a brighter future for themselves and their families.

Over the years, I have witnessed MarketPlace grow, not just in numbers but in spirit. I have seen how the women have nurtured each other's resourcefulness and built a community stitched together with dignity and pride. My own journey with them has been shaped by countless projects, but one in particular still glows in my memory: the day we painted a mural on the side of their workshop.

The women came to the project with such joy and creativity. Each brushstroke carried laughter, stories, and a sense of shared ownership. As the wall filled with color, it became clear we were creating more than a mural—we were giving shape to a collective voice, a visual declaration that beauty belongs in their daily lives. That day reminded me that when art is created in community, it becomes stronger, richer, and more alive.

Years later, I saw that same spirit blossom again when the MarketPlace women joined the Ripples for Peace Initiative. With quiet determination, they stitched and painted flags, each one bearing a deeply personal promise of action for peace. Their words were powerful, tender, and bold testaments to their resilience and creativity. Soon, their flags will be joined by others from across the world, to circle the emerging Buddhas on DuSable Lake Shore Drive, together forming a chorus of voices committed to peace.

This collaboration holds special meaning for me, because it connects two lifelong threads in my own life: art and nonviolence. I grew up in Mumbai, influenced by an artist father, an ardent follower of Gandhi's teachings and a social activist mother. This combination of art and activism has been a major thread of influence that is interwoven into my art and life. It has fueled my passion and commitment to make art part of everyday life, involve local voices and communities in the art process and cultivate peace as individual action.

This belief inspired the Ten Thousand Ripples Initiative in Chicago. One hundred emerging Buddha sculptures were placed in ten neighborhoods across the city, inviting reflection, conversation, and connection. The emerging Buddhas sparked encounters between strangers, opened spaces for dialogue, and invited us to think about how we can find peace in our own lives and leverage the power of the arts to engage our communities. When I think of the Buddhas rising from the ground I see the same impulse that inspired the MarketPlace women's mural and flags—each a ripple of peace, made visible in the world.

Through Ripples for Peace, I hope to continue creating spaces where individuals can pause, reflect, and make their own commitments to peace. The MarketPlace women's work is a reminder that peace is not an abstract concept. It is lived, spoken, stitched, painted, and shared—one ripple at a time.

As I reflect on my long relationship with MarketPlace and look ahead to future collaborations, I am reminded that peace is never the work of one person alone. It is built through countless hands and hearts, each adding its own color, its own strength, to the vast fabric of our shared humanity.

—Indira Freitas Johnson | Sculptor, Community Artist and Nonviolence Educator