Chapter Notes

The Living Art Traditions of India

While we often study art associated with specific dynasties or historical periods, there has always been a parallel, timeless tradition of art created by common people living in villages, forests, and mountains. This art, often called folk art, tribal art, or crafts, is a vital part of India's indigenous knowledge, passed down through generations.

These art forms have existed since pre-historic times, as seen in cave paintings and Indus Valley pottery. Artists in communities have always created beautiful and functional items for daily needs and local markets—from pots and jewellery to ritual sculptures and decorated walls. This art is marked by an instinctive sense of beauty, rich symbolism, and the creative use of locally available materials.

After India's independence, there was a major revival of the handicraft industry. These traditions gained a unique identity and were promoted for commercial production, with each state showcasing its unique art forms. These living traditions are a tangible part of India's heritage, stretching back over five thousand years.

Painting Tradition

India has many popular and vibrant painting traditions. These are not just decorative but are deeply connected to religion, rituals, and daily life.

Mithila painting

Also known as Madhubani painting, this widely recognized folk art comes from the Mithila region of Bihar.

• Origin: It is believed to have originated when people painted the walls of their homes to celebrate the wedding of Lord Rama and Princess Sita. For centuries, women in the region have decorated the mud walls of their houses for ceremonial occasions, especially weddings.
• Themes and Subjects:
  • Religious stories from the Bhagvata Purana, Ramayana, and tales of Shiva-Parvati, Durga, and Krishna.
  • Images of gods, goddesses, animals, and women at work (like carrying water pots).
  • The kohbar ghar (inner room for weddings) features magnificent paintings of a lotus in full bloom (kohbar), which has tantric and metaphorical meaning.
• Characteristics:
  • Bright colours are a key feature.
  • Artists do not like empty spaces and fill the entire canvas with decorative elements from nature like birds, flowers, fish, and the Sun and moon. These elements often symbolize love, fertility, prosperity, and eternity.
• Materials and Technique:
  • Traditionally painted on freshly plastered mud walls. Today, it is also done on fabric, paper, and pots for commercial sale.
  • Artists use bamboo twigs with cotton swabs or rice straw attached as brushes.
  • Colours were originally made from natural sources like flowers (phalsa, kusum), leaves (bilwa), kajal (soot), and turmeric.

Warli painting

This distinctive art form is created by the Warli community living on the west coast of Northern Maharashtra.

• Purpose and Creators: Married women play a central role, creating a special painting called Chowk for occasions like marriages, harvests, and sowing. The paintings are meant to promote fertility, avert diseases, and honor spirits.
• Key Motifs:
  • The central figure is the mother goddess, Palaghat, who represents the corn goddess and fertility. She is enclosed in a small square frame.
  • Her guardian is a headless warrior called Panch Sirya Devata (five-headed god), who has five shoots of corn springing from his neck.
• Themes: The central motif is surrounded by scenes from everyday life, including hunting, fishing, farming, and dancing. The paintings also depict mythological stories and even modern scenes like buses and the urban life of Mumbai.
• Materials and Style:
  • Traditionally painted on earth-colored walls using rice flour.
  • A bamboo stick, chewed at the end, is used as a paintbrush.
  • The style is characterized by simple, geometric shapes like triangles, circles, and squares.

Gond painting

The Gonds of Madhya Pradesh, who once ruled over Central India, have a rich artistic tradition rooted in nature worship.

• Style and Themes: The paintings are often geometric drawings done on the walls of huts. A common theme is Krishna with his cows, surrounded by gopis (milkmaids) carrying pots on their heads. These are votive paintings to which offerings are made.

Pithoro painting

This art is practiced by the Rathva Bhils of Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh.

• Purpose: These large wall paintings are created in homes to mark special occasions or as a form of thanksgiving.
• Composition and Symbolism:
  • The paintings represent the cosmography (the worldview) of the Rathvas.
  • They feature rows of magnificently colored deities depicted as horse riders.
  • The uppermost section shows the world of gods and mythical creatures.
  • A wavy line separates this from the lower section, which represents the earth and depicts the wedding procession of the deity Pithoro, along with kings, farmers, and domestic animals.

Pata painting

Also known as Pachedi or Phad, this is a form of scroll painting done on fabric, palm leaf, or paper. It is practiced in western states like Gujarat and Rajasthan and eastern states like Odisha and West Bengal.

• Bengal Patas: This tradition combines painting on cloth (pata) with storytelling.
  • The artists, called patuas or chitrakars, are performers whose hereditary profession is to travel from village to village.
  • They use the vertically painted scroll as a prop, unrolling it as they sing the narratives depicted in the painting.
• Puri Patas (Patachitra): This style is closely associated with the temple city of Puri in Odisha.
  • Themes: The paintings mainly revolve around Lord Jagannath, his brother Balabhadra, and sister Subhadra. They depict their daily attires (veshas), festivals, and myths.
  • Types: Special paintings include Ansara patti (used to substitute the temple icons during cleaning) and Jatri patti (souvenirs for pilgrims).
  • Technique:
    1. A cotton cloth is coated with a mixture of soft white stone powder and tamarind seed glue.
    2. Borders are drawn first, followed by a direct sketch with a brush.
    3. Flat, organic colors are applied (black from lamp soot, white from conch shells, yellow and red from stones).
    4. The finished painting is held over a charcoal fire, and lacquer is applied to make it water-resistant and glossy.

Phads of Rajasthan

Phads are long, horizontal cloth scrolls painted in the Bhilwara region of Rajasthan to honor folk deities.

• Purpose: They celebrate the valorous tales of bhomias—brave cattle heroes who sacrificed their lives protecting their community's livestock. Deities like Pabhuji and Dev Narayan are worshipped.
• Performance: The scrolls are carried by itinerant bards called bhopas.
  • During night-long performances, the bhopa and a companion narrate and sing the stories depicted on the phad.
  • They use musical instruments like the ravanahattha and illuminate specific parts of the painting with a lamp as the story unfolds.
• Artists: Interestingly, the phads are not painted by the bhopas. They are traditionally painted by the 'Joshis', a caste of artists who were also court painters specializing in miniature paintings. This connection to skilled court artists places phads at a higher artistic level than other similar traditions.

Sculptural Traditions

India also has numerous popular traditions of making sculptures in clay, metal, and stone.

Dhokra casting

This is a prominent metal craft from Bastar (Chhattisgarh), Madhya Pradesh, Odisha, and West Bengal, known for its unique texture and folk motifs.

• Technique: It uses the cire perdue or lost wax technique to cast bronze.
• Craftsmen: The metal craftsmen of Bastar are called ghadwa, which means "to shape or create."
• Products: Traditionally, they made utensils, jewellery, and icons of local deities. As demand for these items decreased, they began creating new decorative objects.

The Dhokra Process (Step-by-Step):

1. A core figure (mould) is made from black soil and rice husk.
2. Once dry, it is covered with a layer of cow dung and clay.
3. Resin from the saal tree is melted and stretched into fine threads or coils.
4. These resin threads are carefully wrapped over the clay core to create the final design and all its decorative details.
5. The entire form is then covered with more layers of clay, with a receptacle (cup) for pouring metal attached.
6. The mould is fired in a furnace. The heat melts the resin, which evaporates, leaving a hollow space in the shape of the design.
7. Molten metal is poured into the mould through the receptacle, filling the space left by the resin.
8. After cooling, the outer clay layer is hammered away to reveal the finished metal image.

Terracotta

Terracotta (baked earth) is the most common sculptural medium found across India.

• Creators and Purpose: Usually made by potters, terracotta pieces are often votives (offerings) for local deities or are used during rituals and festivals.
• Material and Technique: They are made from local clay found near riverbanks or ponds and are baked to make them durable. The pieces can be moulded, modeled by hand, or made on a potter's wheel.
• Subjects: Common forms include images of gods and goddesses like Ganesh and Durga, local deities, animals, and birds. Every region, from Manipur to Kuchchha, has its own unique style of terracotta art.