Ahilya Uddhar

The story of Ahilya is one of the most popular one's. Ahilya was the wife of a sage Gautam and was a renouned beauty. Lord Indra who is a renouned lampat and vyabhichari came one night disguised as the sage himself and bedded her. When Gautam came to know of this he cursed Ahilya and transformed her into a stone. She was liberated by Ram coming and touching her many years later.

This story is often used to indicate the injustice done to women. Ahilya was conned and was not a willing party in the episode but her husband took out his anger on her instead of going after the culprit.

The painting also shows Ahilya on a lotus, a flower which symbolises purity (a lotus grows in mud but is always above it).

Ram, Lakshman and Sita going on Vanvas

Kakayi was the third and youngest wife of King Dushrath of Ayodhya. She cunningly got Dushrath to send his eldest son Ram on exile for fourteen years. Sita and his favorite brother Lakshman followed him. This painting shows a scene of all three going in the jungle.

An interesting bit of this story is what's missing - Urmila, Lakshman's wife who was left behind. Both Ram and Lakshman got married at the same time and whereas Sita came along with Ram, Urmila just had to suffer a fate of loneliness. The story of Urmila is not well explored in Ramayana but has been a topic of some contemporary novels.

Shabari ke Ber

The story of shabari is part of the Ramayana - Shabari is an adivasi lady - adivasis known today as sheduled tribe or ST - she has been praying for long that Lord Ram will come and visit her. When Lord Ram and Lakshman visit her during their search for Sita, she offers them the choicest ber (a fruit) carefully chosen by her. She makes sure that only the sweetest of the fruit is served to the Lord by tasting a little of each that she serves. Lord Ram happily accepts them while Lakshman throws them away. Eating jhootey ber and that too from a low caste women was beyond him. These fruits have further significance in the story when Meghnad (Ravana's son) attacks the two brothers and only Lakshman becomes unconscious but Ram is saved because he had had the jhootey ber of Shabri. Hanuman then gets the sanjivani booti to rescue Lakshman.

This story has been interpreted with various metaphorical meanings attributed to it. I will just stick to the literal for even that too tells an interesting tale. Firstly I had a hard time looking for a suitable term for jhoota in english. Then I realized that this concept is probably uniquely Indian.
Notice that for Shabari there was nothing odd in the practise and she did not think twice before serving half eaten fruit. Strange that adivasi and western thinking coincides :-) Also, the story seems to be an effort to co-opt adivasis in the mainstream hindu fold, there are not many references to tribals in the epics otherwise. Till date many of them have been living aloof from rest of the society and it would have been nice if a broader attempt at assimilation had been done during the time of epics.

Madhubani Paintings

Madhubani Paintings - pronunciation: madhu bunny - derive their name from the madhubani district in Bihar. The name madhuban itself is supposedly derived from the fact that this area was famous for honey (madhu) and had a big forest with lots of honey bees (madhu=honey, forest=ban). These are folk paintings usually painted by rural women on cloth or walls of their houses. Only natural colors are used in these painitings. Natural colors are those made using flowers, leaves, vegetables etc. For example red color is made using hibuscus (gurhal) or rose flower.

Usually madhubani paintings depict scenes from mythology - Ramayana or the life of Lord Krishna or just paintings of gods and godesses. Scenes from daily rural life are also common. Black is the most used color in these painitngs. Outlines of figures and ornamental designs are made in black. It is common to see madhubani paintings made using only black color. The black is usually made of soot.

There are two important elements of the madhubani - bharni (filled up area) and katchni (cross parallel strokes). Usually madhubani's were made on walls smeared with gobar (cow dung). Some traditional artists have taken this tradition on paper and smear the paper with gobar before drawing.

Sugandha's version of madhubani doesn't stay true to the original, traditional madhubani. However, the bharni and katchni are immeditately recognizable in her painitngs. She uses bright colors and has added elements not used in the original. The line drawing in original madhubani is quite simple unlike what she makes. Also, the medium used is poster colors on ivory sheet. Probably we should think of some new name for these paintings but if you see the real madhubani paintings, the simlarity will immediately strike you. So you could say these are Sugandha's Interpretation of the Madhubani - using modern media and sophisticated technique.

Sugandha's Paintings

Starting a photo blog of Sugandha's Paintings. She mostly makes madhubani's (at least right now) so will write a corresponding entry in my blog discussing the scene that she has painted. The caption below the painting will a link to the discussion (want to keep this a pure photoblog). I am not an art critic - yet :-) - so will stay out of discussing the painting per se.