On this page, a collection of folk art from various countries is shown. Pictures of the rich and varied Taiwanese folk art are presented on a separate page, see Culture: Folk art of Taiwan.

In arid desert regions around the world, you often encounter rock walls or boulders, whose surface is covered by a thin, black or reddish-brown layer, maybe as thin as one hundredth of a millimeter, which, over thousands of years, has been formed by microscopic bacteria, living on the rock surface. These bacteria absorb tiny amounts of manganese and iron from the atmosphere, depositing it as a black layer of manganese oxide or a reddish layer of iron oxide on the rock. This layer also includes clay particles, which help to shield the bacteria against drought, extreme heat, and intense solar radiation. (Source: desertusa.com/desert-minerals/desert-varnish)

The Chihuahua is the smallest dog breed in the world, standing only up to 30 centimetres high and weighing between 1.5 and 3 kilograms. This breed first evolved in Mexico, apparently descended from a breed called Techichi, which was a popular dog among the Toltec people.

The Batak are a Malayan people, living in a large area, centered around Lake Toba, central Sumatra, Indonesia. – More pictures of this tribe are found elsewhere on this website, see Gallery: People – Tribals of the Sunda Islands.

Wall paintings, Valparaiso, Chile.

Lady with flowers of frangipani (Plumeria rubra) in her hair. This tree is native to Mexico, Central America, and northernmost South America, but has been introduced to almost all tropical and subtropical countries as an ornamental. Another name of the plant is temple tree, as it is often planted near Buddhist and Hindu temples. (Photo copyright © by Kaj Halberg)

Driving through California, I came across two storage places for hundreds of kitschy wood carvings, at Garberville and Leggett. The pictures below show six examples.

In the city of Haverhill, northern Massachusetts, United States, I noticed two wall paintings and a kitschy sculpture.

“Look and decide!” – Along many trails in the Himalaya, you find interesting information boards, painted by local artists, showing hiking trails, mountains, rivers, villages, and a selection of the local wildlife. These three boards were all encountered in the Modi Khola Valley, Annapurna, Nepal.

This abandoned house in Chile was full of wall paintings, two of which are shown below.

The area around the Wenara Wana Temple (popularly called ‘Monkey Forest’), in Ubud, Bali, Indonesia, is home to several troops of long-tailed macaques (Macaca fascicularis). In Ubud, a local artist has made a number of sculptures, depicting these monkeys. Three are shown below.

Despite being rather non-descript, the edelweiss (Leontopodium alpinum) is one of the most beloved flowers of the Alps and the Balkans. It is a national symbol of several countries: Switzerland, Austria, Slovenia, Romania, and Bulgaria.

This wall in Lambert’s Bay, South Africa, has been decorated by school children.

Painting, depicting jackass penguins (Spheniscus demersus) and gulls. (Photo copyright © by Kaj Halberg)

These kitschy sculptures are displayed outside Pura Ulun Danu Bratan, a Hindu temple near Lake Bratan, Bali, Indonesia.

(Uploaded September 2016)

(Revised continuously)