A History of Mithila Art
In a quiet and remote region near the foothills of the Himalayas for centuries, maybe even millennia, a tradition of mural painting has survived and been passed down from mother to daughter generation after generation.
The murals, alive with colorful gods, totems of fertility, or sacred animals and exploding with a mosaic of abstract shapes and local flora in the background, were painted on exterior walls, in rooms or on the ground to celebrate weddings, festivals or as an act of religious devotion.
It took an earthquake in 1934 for these murals to be discovered by the outside world and a severe drought in the 1960’s for the ancient wall art to make its debut on paper.
Today the Madhubani district in the north of India is home to several cities specializing in this art (known as Mithila art and Madhubani art) and women still dominate the field which has allowed them to gain an unprecedented level of independence and economic freedom.
Mural in the city of Jitwarpur, Madhubani District in India. Photo courtesy of the Dastkari Haat Samiti foundation, photographer Chirodeep Chaudhuri
History
Mithila art in its original format was ephemeral by nature, painted on mud walls and reliably erased by the monsoons every year, which makes determining its origins speculative at best.
Local legend holds that the mural tradition started nearly 3000 years ago when King Janak, a 7th or 8th century BCE ruler of the ancient Mithila Kingdom, commissioned wall paintings across his kingdom to commemorate the marriage of his daughter Sita to Prince Rama. The story of the couple is the central plot for the Ramayana, an ancient Indian epic still loved and relevant in Indian culture today, not unlike the Odyssey and Iliad for the West. While this legend is romantic and has some basis in the epic poem, it is impossible to substantiate.
What we can say is references to the art go as far back as the 1300’s CE where a famous poet from the region mentions the art and the women painters.
Transition of the art form to handmade paper started in the 1960’s as a relief effort during a famine to help locals earn money by selling art in New Delhi and other cities in India.
Women artists at work in the city of Jitwarpur, Madhubani District in India. Photo courtesy of the Dastkari Haat Samiti foundation, photographer Chirodeep Chaudhuri
Technique
To create the characteristic bold color palette, women foraged in the forests for flowers, fruits, leaves, spices, and vegetables to create dyes and used powdered rice for a paste.
Today artists who have access to, and can afford it, have adopted the use of acrylic paint which gives a more modern and vibrant edge to the traditional technique, and some will mix acrylic paints with natural dyes for a hybrid look.
The majority of artist still use handmade paper, but some have started to use canvas and other materials such as wood, cloth and even glass as way to innovate.
Another modern introduction is the use of paint brushes and pen and ink to achieve the extremely fine detail you can see in more accomplished works of the genre. Traditionally though, women would use twigs, fingers and sticks wrapped with a tip of cloth to create the drawings and paint them in.
Since it’s transfer to paper Mithila art has continued to evolve with not only new techniques but also new subject matter, moving away from Hindu gods to bulldozers in some cases.
But at its core it remains an art steeped in tradition and devoted to India’s rich cultural heritage that has been passed down orally for thousands of years through religious texts such as the Veda’s, Upanishads and Puranas and the great epics the Mahabharata and the Ramayana, all of which provide interesting characters and stories for the artists.
Today you can find Mithila art in museums and private collections around the world and the first museum outside of India fully dedicated to the art form can be found in Tokamachi, Japan.