With this
exhibition « Indian Naïve Artists »
(March 21st - June 30th
2002) the Museum broadened its horizons and embraced
regions which, until now, had not been included in the
original collection. Here is an invitation to discover
the richness of a culture, its rites and customs.
Spreading from the foothills of the Himalyas to the Pakistan
border, "Patachitra" is an ancient form of art,
which -despite the impact of modernity- is still practised,
mostly by self-taught artists in rural areas.
Painted on paper, cloth or parchment rolls, Patachitra
were originally made using mineral or vegetable and plant
pigments, with pure primary colours dominating. Unrolled,
some extend to a length of three metres. They are divided
into different scenes which tell a story. According to
custom, they depict numerous legendary adventures (mythical
and historical) drawn from the religious and the secular.
Some also illustrate everyday life scenes. The vibrancy
of the figures is akin to the aesthetics of Naïve
Art through the accuracy of detail and brilliance of colour.
These "scroll-paintings" had no market value :
They remained in the possession of the minstrels who took
them from village to village, scrolling and inscrolling
them many times a day, in order to sing their stories.
Patachitra are often the only precious possessions
of a population which is still partly nomad. The exhibition
presents a series of Patachitra created during
the last ten years in the remote villages of the Bihar
region, where ancestral tradition of entirely hand painted
parchment rolls persists. Bihar, India’s second
most populous state but also its poorest, most backward
region, suffers from a financial and social situation
which contrasts sharply with its glorious past ;
thus the promotion of this form of art is essential, from
a historical, cultural and educational point of view.
Among the religious themes presented in the exhibition
is the Ramayana Epic (see right), one of the two classical
Indian epics along with Mahâbhârata. This
seven-book and 48000-verse poem is said to have been composed
at the beginning of the present era ; it recounts
the adventures of the ‘enchanting’ Rama, exiled
to the forest with his brother Lakshaman and wife Sita,
where they encounter various demons and animals. |
