About EFA and Mithila Painting

A report on a preliminary investigation in Madhubani, Patna, and Delhi, India and The Mithila Museum, Tokamachi, Niigata, Japan, December 2001 and January 2002, by Joseph Elder, Parmeshwar Jha, and David Szanton for the Ethnic Arts Foundation

David L. Szanton

In Delhi: serious problems - but potentials as well

The Craft Museum in Delhi has several splendid Mithila paintings from the 1980s on display, and in the 1980s these culturally rich, colorful, and/or finely drawn paintings were highly sought. At that time several Mithila painters . all women - were commissioned to paint a variety of public and private buildings, and numerous publications were devoted to its ritual roots, and its commercial development. At least 10 painters won numerous National and State prizes in India, were feted by politicians, and held individual and group shows at festivals, galleries, and museums across the US, Europe, and Japan. Mithila painting was a colorful and exciting phenomena and a major cultural export for India.

Today, however, interest in Mithila painting has declined dramatically. The Delhi markets are dominated by so-called Mithila godana paintings that usually consist of small repetitive designs said to be based on .tattoos.. They are almost always painted on top of a light brown cow-dung wash spread over the soft white handmade paper. In general these paintings, and others of more traditional styles, seem crudely executed, and mass produced, even if by hand. Many apparently come at little or no cost from short-term government sponsored training programs. The prices for the standard 22x30 paintings asked at the Bihar Emporium are mostly Rupees 650 to 1,500. Those at the Dilli Haat are sold by dealers who purchase them in and around Madhubani for about 200 Rupees or less, and then attempt to sell them for Rupees 1,200 to 2,600. Those producing these paintings in Madhubani claim there is strong demand for these paintings, especially from Indian purchasers. In contrast, the large stacks of godana paintings at the Delhi Emporia, Dilli Haat, and the Craft Museum, and the dealers complaints about poor sales, suggests otherwise. In fact, the large supplies may simply derive from the apparently numerous government training programs which attract large numbers of participants thanks to their stipends of 300 Rupees per month. In theory, these training programs may be intended to help rural people develop a marketable skill. In reality, they seem more of a commendable subsidy for the rural poor, but which unfortunately is having a side effect of diminishing the reputation of a major artistic tradition.

But whatever the motivation, the godana paintings are not the kinds of paintings that have over the last decades attracted middle class and professional European, American, Japanese, or Indian buyers. None of the paintings currently for sale at any of the Delhi locations seem to come from any of the better artists . i.e., those combining technical skill, care in execution, and imaginative or innovative imagery or design - in the villages around Madhubani. And indeed, several of these artists we met in Madhubani specifically indicated that they refused to do business with the dealers seeking their paintings. They claimed there is an exploitative price differential, and that the dealers often fail to pay them for paintings taken with promises of payment when they are sold.

Equally problematic, seemingly as a direct consequence of the poor quality work flooding Delhi, private gallery dealers, museum directors, and potential buyers in the city have completely lost interest in showing or purchasing Mithila paintings. The Delhi market has simply turned them away from the tradition which is now, at best, perceived as a low quality commercialized folk art intended for tourists. As a result, in recent years only one Delhi gallery (Gallerie Ganesha) has had a show of paintings by a Mithila painter, that of a young man, Neelkant Choudhary, a fine painter whose work is clearly rooted in the Mithila tradition, but whose style and subject matter have evolved towards a more general urban market interested in rural themes.

If interest in the art world of Delhi, and other urban centers and markets in India, is to be re-ignited, and if the tradition is to become a serious source of income for the better painters - and among Mithila painters generally - the quality of the paintings (design, execution, innovation of subject matter, etc.) available to the more demanding and wealthier publics must be improved. This does not, however, seem impossible. Several professionals in Delhi to whom we showed a sample of the 50 paintings purchased in Madhubani in January 2002 indicated immediate interest in purchasing one or two. In addition, a leading art historian, Dr. Geeti Sen, has agreed to visit Madhubani towards the end of 2002 in order to meet the painters and get a personal sense of the situation, and to then curate a major exhibition of the best Mithila painting in Delhi sometime in 2003. Such an exhibition . which might travel to other cities (and internationally) as well, might re-establish the reputation of Mithila painting in urban India and beyond. It will take some effort and imagination, but it seems possible, worthwhile, and even important to try.

2. In Madhubani- A complex picture but continued vitality

In Madhubani and the surrounding villages the situation looks quite different. There are clearly problems on the ground, but there are also great potentials as well. To begin with there are at least four different sets of people or communities which need to be distinguished:

As far as we could tell, at present, painters painting on paper are largely limited to seven or eight villages relatively close to Madhubani town (Jitwarpur, Ranti, Harinagar, Lariagange, Rashidpur, Ramnagar, Mangarauni, and Rampatti). However, painting on walls and floors for marriage, life cycle, and seasonal ceremonies is still being done in a much larger number of villages over a much wider area, reaching as far as Dharbanga on the west, north to and across the border with Nepal, and how far east and south we do not know. There are certainly hundreds, if not thousands, of painters in this wider region. However, at this point we have no idea who they are, what they are painting, and what kinds of undiscovered talents might be among them. In 1972, the late German anthropologist, folklorist, and film maker, Erica Moser, conducted a survey of a wide range of such villages with the help of Gauri Mishra. The results of the survey appear not to have been published, but we will be contacting Moser.s son in Germany in the hope that he might be able to provide, or indicate the whereabouts of, the survey materials. They would be an extremely useful baseline for any similar efforts to determine the extent of the painting tradition today. It would appear, however, that there is a vast number of painters in the outlying villages who might bring new visions and talents to painting on paper.
There are large numbers of painters (perhaps in the 100s), many quite young, mostly women, but some men as well (many in Jitwarpur, but also in other villages), who are now doing the godana .tattoo. paintings showing up in the Delhi craft markets. These paintings are generally associated with the Harijan castes. We were given two different versions of how these paintings came to be. One version was that in the early 1970s Erica Moser suggested using these designs as many lower caste individuals had elaborate body tattoos that could serve as local and distinctive aesthetic sources for painting on paper. The other version was that godana painting was suggested by itinerant tattoo artists. In either case, it appears that many of the Bihar State sponsored training programs during the 1990s (said to require 40% Harijan students), have encouraged the expansion of godana painting, either as a means of providing an alternative to, or countering, upper caste domination, or because of a perceived market for such paintings, or both. In any event, these are the mass produced paintings that now flood the Delhi market, and that have devalued the tradition in the eyes of urban gallery operators, museum curators, and urbanites generally.
There is a small but now increasingly elderly generation of painters many of whom have been honored with State and National awards and who have often been invited to national and international exhibitions. These painters are quite diverse in their styles and subject matter, and together they established the high repute of the Mithila painting tradition in the 1970s and 1980s. Perhaps the most famous, Ganga Devi, the subject of a splendid book by Jyotindra Jain, died of cancer several years ago. Her counterpart, Sita Devi, is still alive, but due to cataracts, is now totally blind. Mahasundari Devi seems in good health, but now only does very small paintings. Jamuna Devi and Karpoori Devi stopped painting some time ago. Leela Devi and Lalitha Devi are both still painting, but no longer have the sure hand or eye they once had. Krishnanad Jha is still painting extremely well, but his hand shakes with a significant tremor when he is not painting. Fortunately, at least for the moment, the tremor disappears when he paints. Shanti Devi, depressed by conflict with her husband, the death of Ray Owens, and loss of a market, has run some training programs, but did not paint at all during 2000 and 2001. She only began again during our visit in January 2002. Gopal Saha continues to produce his sharp and colorful observations and commentaries on local society. Baua Devi continues to do her classic sun, moon, and Krishna paintings, and to elaborate her extraordinary snake paintings, but she herself noted that she expects to continue only two more years. Godavari Dutta retains a steady hand and remains highly productive and original in her paintings. Significantly, both Godavari Dutta and Baua Devi have seven times spent three to six months a year at Tokio Hasegawa.s Mithila Museum in central Japan. (More on the role of Hasegawa and the Mithila Museum below.) In effect, most of the major painters of the senior generation are still alive and variously active, but it cannot be long before most, if not all, stop painting. All, however, are plagued, limited, and depressed by lack of a Delhi or national Indian market for their work.
For no doubt deep cultural and historical reasons, the Mithila tradition continues to produce highly talented painters. In two weeks there we were able to identify a number of younger painters, mostly in their 30s, who in terms of their individual technical and innovative talents and the overall quality of their work might well carry on from the acclaimed, but eventually passing, senior generation. This younger generation includes people like Santosh Kumar Das (Ranti), Bipha Das (Ranti), Vinita Jha (from?), Neelkant Chaudhaury (Madhubani town), Dulari Devi (Ranti), Urmila Devi (Jitwarpur), and the still younger Ram Bharosh (from?). These young painters, and the no doubt others like them yet to be identified, seem to have the potential to become the .next generation. of major painters. Currently, however (with the exception of Neelkant Chaudhaury who has had a private gallery show in Delhi), they lack access to, and the important stimulus and confidence created by, national and international markets, or national and international recognition for their paintings. The Ethnic Arts Foundation, through a number of activities described below, hopes to focus most of its attention to the development of this younger generation of potentially world-class artists.
Some general observations about Mithila painting today

Before proceeding to a potential program of activities for the Ethnic Arts Foundation in this context, it will be useful to make a number of additional observations about the current situation of Mithila painting.

It seems important to stress that this is Mithila painting and encourage the use of this designation - rather than .Madhubani painting.. Madhubani is a town and political district, but the painting is rooted in and derives from the historic Mithili cultural tradition that extends well beyond the town and district. The geographical term, Madhubani, is much less significant than the culture-historical entity, Mithila.
There is continuing local interest in developing the painting tradition. In December 2001 a highly regarded retired judge in Madhubani town organized a competition for young painters between the ages of 12 and 18. He provided a large hall as a venue, paper for the contestants, and the choice of three subjects, any one of which they could select to paint in an allotted hour and a half. Although the competition was not widely advertised, 109 young women entered, and 15 received prizes from a panel of judges composed of members of the senior generation of award winning painters. Everyone involved felt it was a great success, and the judge now plans to make the contest an annual event, and anticipates a still larger pool of contestants next year.
It is undoubtedly significant that the 109 contestants who came to the December 2001 competition were all young women, as Mithila painting has historically been known as a .women.s tradition,. rooted in women.s ritual activities passed on from generation to generation. Young girls learn the ritual floor and wall paintings from their mothers, aunts, and older sisters. At least in recent years, however, as painting has become a potential source of income, small but significant numbers of men have also taken up painting. The men, some teenagers, some adults, maintain recognizably Mithila styles and techniques, but tend to avoid the ritual subject matter of the women.s paintings, instead usually depicting more secular or tantric images. The parallel (competitive?) development of gender specific subject matter is worth careful research.
Most painters in the area are only familiar with the paintings being done by others in their immediate surroundings, i.e. by their immediate family and neighbors. Ironically and unfortunately, it is only outsiders (like us) who can take the time to visit different families in different villages in order to see - and possibly purchase paintings . and thus develop a concrete sense of the range and diversity of the paintings being done across the various communities. This kind of isolation is sometimes justified locally in terms of a fear that other painters will .steal. one.s ideas. But it also reduces the mutual stimulation (and no doubt a degree of competition) which the ability to see each other.s paintings would produce.
The development and continuing creativity of Mithila painting on paper is deeply rooted in an ancient cultural tradition and set of aesthetic styles and will only retain its vitality and identity if it continues to build upon and draw upon these roots. Yet it, especially in its commercialized . on paper . form, it has also been dependent upon interaction with a series of outsiders who have recognized its inherent strengths, interacted with the painters, encouraged various forms of innovation, and who have brought the paintings to the attention of larger and distant audiences. Over the years these have included William and Mildred Archer in the 1930s to 1950s, Uppendra Maharati in the 1950s and 1970s, Baskhar Kulkarni in the 1960s, Pupil Jayakar in the 1960s and 1970s, Erica Moser and Yves Vequaud in the 1970s, Raymond and Naomi Owens in the 1970s and 1980s, and Ray Owens again in 2000, Mary Lanius in the 1980s, Jyotindra Jain and Tokio Hasegawa since the 1980s, and Raymond Owens. colleagues in the Ethnic Arts Foundation (especially Joe Elder, Parmeshwar Jha, and David Szanton) from the 1980s to the present. As with so many other artistic traditions around the world, this interaction between .insiders. and .outsiders. has been essential to the development and continuing vitality of the Mithila painting.
State of Bihar and National awards, and the explicit support of national political figures and scholars have also been crucial in the recognition and development of Mithila painting. Figures like Indira Gandhi, and Minister of Transport, Lalit Narayan Mishra, and Minister of Communication, Ram Vilas Paswan, have been influential in underscoring the quality and significance of both the tradition and of individual painters by commissioning series of paintings in hotels, railway stations (e.g., eight in Madhubani station alone), other public buildings and venues, and even in a set of commemorative postage stamps. Likewise, a number of Indian scholars; most notably Pupul Jayakar, Jyotinda Jain, Devaki Jain, Upendra Thakur, Mulk Raj Anand have published important works dealing with Mithila painting. Unfortunately, the State of Bihar stopped giving awards and commissions many years ago, and no national awards have gone to any of the painters in recent years . at least partly as a result of losing highly placed champions and the terrible politics of Bihar. The lack of these various forms of state recognition, the reduction of the market to godana paintings, the large number of people now producing them, and the bad roads from Patna to Madhubani which minimize outside visitors and tourist traffic, have all combined to produce a general sense of depression among the local painters.
The painting tradition has nevertheless continuously expanded in its themes and subject matter both as an inevitable consequence of on-going changes and development in local and national Indian society, and as a result of its external interactions. Historically painted on walls and floors, and initially when painted on paper as well, the painters concentrated on images, diagrams, and deities related to marriage, other life cycle rituals, and various weekly and seasonal celebrations. These subjects still remain central to the repertoire. However, many painters now are also painting episodes from both the Ramayana and other more local folklore and legends, daily scenes of life in the villages, autobiographical paintings, and social and political commentaries. These paintings may involve single images, a series of episodes in a single painting, or sets of linked paintings (up to 31 in once case), depicting a continuous narrative. Likewise, caste differences in subject matter and techniques are now breaking down with Brahmins and Dusadhs drawing from each other.s previously distinctive subject matters and painting styles. The painters now also move back and forth among natural and commercial colors and pigments, and painting on cloth and paper. And while much of the painting remains on the .standard. 22 x 30 hand made and now acid free paper, both much larger and much smaller paintings are now common. This is not a fixed or repetitive tradition. The best painters are rooted in and given confidence by the tradition. But their simultaneous openness to innovation has enabled Mithila painting to retain its extraordinary vitality and creativity as well.
External recognition and access to markets for the best painters has been essential to maintaining their commitment and productivity. From 1977 through 1988, Raymond Owens and the Ethnic Arts Foundation he helped to found, purchased some 1,500 paintings at over-the-local-market prices, and then displayed and sold them in exhibitions, conferences, and to interested individuals and museums in the United States. When paintings were sold, the profits were subsequently passed as .feedback payments. back to the individual artists, to their Master Craftsman.s Association (while it existed), or else were used to purchase still more paintings from, over time, some 60 different Mithila painters. The Ethnic Arts Foundation was unable to continue purchasing paintings between 1988 and 1999, and only began again in 2000. However, during the late 1980s and all through the 1990s, Tokio Hasegawa.s program of bringing the best painters to his mountain top Mithila Museum in central Japan, took up this slack. Hasegawa was able to bring 8 or 9 of the best painters to his Museum for periods of three to six months, and to provide them with space, encouragement, and undisturbed time to do their best possible work. Some Mithila painters came as often as seven times and they have produced some of the finest and most innovative Mithila painting we have seen. The painters are provided their international travel, board and lodging, and (currently) 12,000 Rupees per month. Hasegawa lives frugally, retains some of their paintings for the Museum, but sells others at exhibitions he organizes every year in different cities around Japan. The proceeds from these sales help to maintain the Museum and cover the costs of the visiting painters. This system worked well during the economic boom in Japan when there was a strong market for art and municipalities could help with the cost of the Museum and the exhibitions. The current recession in Japan is making it much more difficult to continue this system. Strikingly, Baua Devi noted that the 72,000 Rupees she obtained for six months at the Museum enabled her to live with and support her family in India for the other six months of the year . where in fact she is able to do much less painting because of family obligations, constraints, and distractions. This seems likely to be true for other Mithila artists as well.
Currently, Patna, the state capital of Bihar plays no role in supporting Mithila painting, although in fact it could. The Shilp Anusandhan Sansthan, Digha (The Handcraft Institute of Design, Digha) founded by Uppendra Maharathi on the edge of Patna in the early 1950s has a large (badly stored) collection of Mithila paintings. Among others it has many Mithila paintings submitted for various state awards, many of which were never in fact awarded. (These paintings ought to be well cared for, displayed, or returned to the artists for them to keep or sell.) The Institute also has a vast, unique, collection of numerous different forms of craftwork and archeological materials collected by Uppendra Maharathi in the 1940s and 1950s from villages all over Bihar. At present this collection seems rarely visited, poorly maintained, and very poorly displayed. Given some new energy and leadership, the Institute could become the basis for a serious culture/historical education program with the local schools, the local public, and Indian and foreign tourists (see Appendix A for some specifics).
Ironically, while there has been little recent interest in Mithila painting in India, it is becoming well known and much appreciated in other parts of the world. There have been numerous exhibitions of Mithila paintings either alone, or with other Indian art forms, in the US, France, Germany, Switzerland as well as those regularly organized by Tokio Hasegawa in Japan. These exhibitions often result in sales of paintings and the production of an illustrated catalogue. Aside from the Mithila Museum in Japan, there are now large collections of Mithila paintings and photos of paintings from the 1930s and 1940s from the Richard and Mildred Archer in the British Library, in San Francisco.s Asian Art Museum, the Berkeley Art Museum, the Oberlin University Museum, the Syracuse University Library, the University of Florida Museum, Heidelberg University, and no doubt others. And aside from Jyotindra Jain.s fine volume on Ganga Devi, a number of other books and articles about the painting tradition, or using Mithila paintings to illustrate a story, are currently in print or forthcoming. One of the most promising is the recent doctoral dissertation by Mani Shekhar Singh, .Folk Art, Identity and Performance: A Sociological Study of Maithil Painting.. But again, most of the new publications and catalogues are coming from outside India. There are also several videos about various aspects of the tradition that have been made by French, US, Japanese, and UNESCO film makers (see Appendix B for a preliminary list of these publications, exhibitions, videos, etc.).
Two weeks in Madhubani and the surrounding villages was barely enough time to scratch the surface of all the interesting and important questions that need to be addressed to fully understand, appreciate, and promote the evolving Mithila painting tradition. Appendix C lists a number of research projects that would be extremely useful in this connection, and which could lead to a variety of MA or PhD theses, academic or popular books and articles, more journalistic stories, videos, coffee-table volumes, and children.s. picture books. Such materials would help to demonstrate to the larger world that the Mithila tradition is still producing stunning paintings and world-class artists
A Potential Program for the Ethnic Arts Foundation
Continue to purchase high quality Mithila paintings for sale to individuals, collectors, and museums in the US and elsewhere and to provide .feedback. payments to artists whose work has been sold.
Make a systematic digital photograph collection of all paintings purchased or obtained since 2000 and which are not already in EAF.s three large color photo albums.
Create an Ethnic Arts Foundation Website on which to mount, among other things, the digital photographs of the paintings.
Update, complete, and illustrate Ray Owens. book length manuscript on the lives of five Mithila painters for publication in the US and India. Fund University of Wisconsin (or other) South Asia graduate students to help complete the volume.
Press for rapid publication of Baua Devi.s Snake Story in the US and India.
Find an author to put together .The Murder Story,. with Krishnanad Jha.s 31 stunning paintings illustrating this dramatic case.
Establish in Madhubani an experimental Training Program for Mithila Painters for 15 to 20 carefully selected and highly talented students, 16 to 30 years old, drawn from Madhubani and the surrounding area. Santosh Kumar Das will be the primary instructor, with specialized assistance from other major artists on a part time basis. Classes will begin in mid-2002, and run four hours a day, five days a week, for three or four semesters. EAF would provide rental space; faculty and staff funding; student fellowships and materials; slides, books and videos, etc; graduation exhibition, prize and ceremony expenses. Parmeshwar Jha will return to Madhubani mid-year to help initiate the training program
Support and encourage an (annual??) exhibition in Madhubani and Darbhanga of Mithila paintings by wide variety of painters to enable them to see each other.s work. This exhibition might coincide with the graduation exhibition of the EAF/Mithila Training Program and also draw on several NGO training programs currently operating in Darhbanga.)
Help to establish an organization to promote Mithila painting, perhaps .the National Association of Mithila Painters. or revive the earlier Master Craftsman Association of Mithila. Among other things, it could promote wider awareness of Mithila painting by making a substantial annual major award for the best painter who has not previously received such an award.
Encourage further competitions for young painters in Madhubani, but also in Dharbanga and perhaps Patna, both to draw further attention to the painting tradition and also to identify the most talented students for scholarships at the experimental Mithila Training Program in #7 above.
Develop a small fellowship program to encourage and support doctoral dissertation and postdoctoral research projects, writing, and publication on the Mithila painting tradition.
Fund Dr. Geeti Sen to spend a period of time in Madhubani and the surrounding villages to meet the painters in late 2002, and to plan and curate an exhibition in Delhi in 2003 . possibly at the Lalit Kala Kendra or the India International Center. Explore possibilities for re-mounting the exhibit in Bombay, Bangalore, Calcutta, Patna, etc, as well as possible international sites.
Encourage, and lend materials to other planned exhibitions of Mithila paintings or Indian art generally.
Long term, develop a systematic bibliography of material (books, articles, catalogues, videos, films, websites, etc.) on Mithila painting, and a list of past major exhibitions and collections to be mounted on the EAF website. Appendix B is a first step in this direction.
Assist in any ways possible, Mr. J.R.K. Rao, Director of Industries in Bihar, to reinvigorate the Patna Institute founded by Uppendra Maharathi as a major Cultural Center for, among many other things (see Appendix A below), the care, exhibition, and sale of Mithila paintings.
Reconstitute and expand the Ethnic Arts Foundation Board and Officers to support this enlarged program.

Appendix A

Reinvigorating the Shilp Anusandhan Sansthan, Digha (The Handcraft Institute of Design, Digha) founded by Uppendra Maharathi

The current state of the Shilp Anusandhan Sansthan Digha is somnolent, if not moribund. The Institute has a stunning collection of craft and archeological materials collected by Uppendra Maharathi during the 1940s and 1950s, as well as numerous Mithila paintings by major artists of the tradition. The collection, however, is poorly maintained and rarely visited. The substantial library seems out of date and unused. The craft training programs are drawing very few students. The Institute has a large staff and the physical resources (buildings, working space, collections, library) to play a serious and creative role as a Cultural Center for Bihar. However, it needs leadership, a sense of vision, and set of public programs to give it new visibility.

Some suggestions:

The American Institute of Indian Studies (AIIS) in Delhi and Pune have major collections and archives as well as world-class curators who are generally pleased to provide guidance and training to those responsible for similar collections in India. They could be asked to provide technical assistance in cleaning, preservation, maintenance, display, cataloging, and program development at the Patna Institute. (For example, Mithila paintings should be stored dry and flat in drawers or portfolios, not, as at present, rolled and open to moist (or dusty) air.) Preliminary contacts should probably be made with Shubha Chaudhury, the Head of the AIIS Archive and Research Center for Ethnomusicology in Delhi (tel: 462-5383), and perhaps subsequently with the Head of the AIIS Center for Art and Archeology in Pune.
The Ford Foundation in Delhi has long had a program in support of Cultural activities in India. The staff person in charge of the Ford Foundation program left late last year and will be replaced in September 2002 by Sumati Rana, an historian from the University of Michigan. New Ford staff often bring new program ideas, but it is believed that the Ford program will focus on links between Culture and Education. If so, this would seem an ideal combination . and new justification - for the Patna Institute. It is also possible that overseas training in curatorship could be obtained from the Asian Cultural Council, a foundation based in New York City. Selected Institute staff might also be sent to the Craft Museum in Delhi for both program ideas and specialized training.
After cleaning the grounds, the collections, and the display cases, and assuring the proper preservation and maintenance of the items, the Institute could develop a variety of programs to bring school children to see the collections and learn about the rich craft traditions, art, and cultural history of Bihar. Students at the local colleges, universities, and art schools could be encouraged to use and conduct research on the collections. The broader public could be invited to see - and even add to - the existing collections. Craftsmen and artists could be invited to give regular demonstrations of their skills and techniques for the schools, art schools, and general public. The Institute could also provide materials and staff for lectures, exhibitions, and demonstrations in surrounding schools.
The Institute could organize major exhibitions (and sales) of contemporary Bihar art and crafts. As the State of Bihar is no longer providing awards to its artists and craftsmen, the Institute might begin to provide annual or semi-annual prizes or awards for the best work. (In the process it might re-institute and re-legitimate the A, B, C, D quality standards initiated by the Institute.s founder, Uppendra Maharathi.) Seriously judged exhibitions and awards would encourage artists and craftsmen to do and show their best work. They would also draw residents of Patna and the surrounding area, and possibly visitors from Delhi and even foreign tourists.
It will be important for the Institute to make digital photographs of the entire collection which might be maintained in a catalogue or website for research purposes, enhanced security, training activities, and public information. At a minimum the catalogue or website should include the following information: the date and location the item was collected, its local name and use, the name of the craftsperson or artist who produced it, some indication of how rare or widespread the item is, etc.
Institute staff might take an active role in seeking domestic and international markets for Bihar artists and craftsmen. Even small successes in this area could encourage the maintenance and further development of art and craft traditions in Bihar.
Institute staff might write brochures or guides to the specific collections to help inform students and the general public, or more ambitiously, be encouraged to write accounts or histories of particular crafts and their variations across the several regions of Bihar (or beyond).
In general, Bihar has a terrible national and international reputation as being among the poorest and most corrupt and violent States in India, and heavily marked by caste politics. A single institution cannot turn that around. But as a vigorous, creative, innovative, publicly oriented Cultural Center, the Shilp Anusandhan Sansthan, Digha could demonstrate to India, and to the world, that Bihar has its bright, positive, and promising spots as well.

Appendix B

A Preliminary List of Publications, Exhibitions, Catalogues, Videos, and Films dealing explicitly with Mithila Painting

Publications

Anand, Mulk Raj. 1984. Madhubani Painting. New Delhi.

Archer, Mildred. 1977. Indian Popular Paintings in the India Office Library. New Delhi. UBS Publishers.

Archer, Mildred. 1966. Domestic Arts of Mithila: Notes on Painting. Marg 20.1 p.47-52.

Archer, William G. 1949. Maithil Painting. Marg 3, 3: 24.33.

Brown, Carolyn Henning. 1982. Folk Art and the Art of Books: Who Speaks for the Traditional Artist? Review of .The Art of Mithila,. by Yves Vequaud. Modern Asian Studies 16.3 p.519-522.

Brown, Carolyn Henning. 1996. Contested Meanings: Tantra and the Poetics of Mithila Art. American Ethnologist. 23(4) p. 717-737.

Chavda, Jagdish J. 1990. The Narrative Paintings of India.s Jitwarpuri Women. Woman.s Art Journal, Spring Summer, Volume 11, Number 1. p. 25-28.

Hart, Lynn M. 1995. Three Walls: Regional Aesthetics and the International Art World. In The Traffic in Culture: Refiguring Art and Anthropology. Edited by George E. Marcus and Fred R. Myers. University of California Press, Berkeley. p.127-150.

Hasegawa, Tokio. Nd. Cosmology of Prayer. In Japanese. 42 illustrations in color, and 43 in black and white of paintings in the collection of the Mithila Museum. Mithila Museum.

Hasegawa, Tokio. Nd. Ganga Devi. With Introductions by Pupul Jayakar and Jyotindra Jain. Black and white and color illustrations of 26 painting by Ganga Devi, plus designs of 72 kobhar and aripan motifs. Mithala Museum.

Hiatt, Shobha. 9/1997. Baua Devi and the Art of Mithila. India Currents. p.34 .

Jain, Jyotindra. 1995. The Bridge of Vermilion: Narrative Rhythm in the Dusadh Legends of Mithila. In Indian Painting: Essays in Honor of Karl J. Khandalavala. Edited by B.N. Goswamy and Usha Bhatia. Lalit Kala Akademi, New Delhi. p 207-22 Jain, Jyotindra. 1997. Ganga Devi: Tradition and Expression in Mithila Painting. Ahmedabad, Mapin.

Jayakar, Pupul. 1969. Painitings: Forms of gay abandon. Marg 22.4.47

Jayakar, Pupul 1975. Paintings of Rutal India. The Times of India Annual: 53-62

Jayakar, Pupul, 1980 The Earthen Drum: An Introduction to the Ritual Arts of Rural India. National Museum of New Delhi.

Jayakar, Pupul. 1989. The Earth Mother. New Delhi: Penguin Books

Jha, Indramohan. 1984. Vaivhik Citravali. In Mithili. Ranti: Ayurvidya Bhawan.

Jha, Ratnadhar. n.d. Mithila Painting, In Lessor Known Forms of Performing Arts in India. Edited by Durga Das Mukhopadhyay, Calcutta Pp: 38-44

Jha, Sarb Narayan, n.d. Aripan. In Hindi. Vismrit Mithila Prakashan.

Jha, Shri Lakshminath. 1962 (Reprinted 1999). Mithila Ki Sanskritika Lokchitrakala. In Hindi

Jha, V. and P.K. Basak. 1994. Ethnobotanical Aspects of Mithil Painting. Ethnobotany 6. p 9-18.

Lanius, Mary. 198?? Mithila Painting. In Making Things in South Asia: The role of artists and craftsmen. Edited by Michael W. Meister. Philadelphia, University of Pennsylvania

Mathur, J.C. 1996. The Domestic Arts of Mithila. Marg 20.1. p 43-46.

Owens, Raymond. 2/1983. MCAM and EAF: A Framework for Effective Art Marketing and Development. Ethnic Arts Foundation.

Owens, Raymond, et al. Sita Devi Goes to Heaven. Unfinished manuscript currently in preparation.

Singh, Mani Shekhar. 1999. Folk Art, Identity and Performance: A Sociological Study of Maithil Painting. Ph. D. Dissertation, Department of Sociology, University of Delhi.

Singh, Mani Shekhar. 2000. A journey into pictoral space: Poetics of frame and field in Maithil painting. Contributions to Indian Sociology (n.s.). 34, 3. p 409-442.

Tanaka, Beatrice. The Snake Story (illustrated by Baua Devi). In French. (56 rue de la Verrerie, 75004 Paris, tel: 42-78-1567).

Thukur, Upendra. 1982. Madhubani Painting. Delhi, Upkar Press. or Abhinav Publications, e-37 Hauz Khas, New Delhi 110016.

Vequaud, Yves. 1977. Women Painters of Mithila. London. Thames and Hudson.

Susan Snow Wadley. 2002. Mithila Paintings. Catelogue for an exhibition at Syracuse University, November 2002 to January 2003.

????? Small volume with numerous plates of Mithila paintings in Japanese. http://www.ask.or.jp/.kshoin/ e-mail: kshoin@ask.or.jp

Partial list of Exhibitions and Catalogues

Mithila Paintings, Musédes Arts Dératifs, Paris, Spring 1975

L.Art De Mithila. Musee des Arts Decoratifs, Villamonth 4, Lausanne, Switzerland, March 16 . May 21, 1978. 130 paintings from the collection of Yves Vequaud.

Mithila Folk Paintings. Huntington Gallery, The Art Museum, University of Texas at Austin. September 19 to November 19, 1978. Curator: Raymond Owens, small catalogue

Paintings and Drawings from Mithila, North India. Shwayder Art Gallery, University of Denver. Curator: Mary Lanius. October 6 to 21, 19??

Smithsonian Exhibition of Mithila Paintings, 1980

Magiciens de la Terre. Editions Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris, 1989. The World of Indian Folk Art: The Cosmos of Prayer: Painting of Mithila, Baua Devi, Ganga Devi, Godavari Dutta, Shanti Devi.

Imaginary Museum of Contemporatry Art (IMOCA). Exhibition of paintings by Baua Devi, Shanti Devi, Ganga Devi, and Godavari Dutta. July 15 to September 17, 1997. Tokyo?

Madhubani, Art Tribal de I.Inde. Catalogue of an exhibition in Reunion. Introduction by Jyotindra Jain. Curator: Jean Barbier, http://www.cg974.fr e-mail: musee.villele@cg974.fr

Baua Devi and the Art of Mithila. Matrix Gallery, Berkeley Art Museum, University of California, August 15 to October 26, 1997. Curator: Lawrence Rinder.

Hyogo Prefectural Maruyamagawa Folk Museum of Art. August 8 to October 4, 1998

Mithila Paintings, Syracuse University, November 17, 2002 to January 6, 2003

Videos and Films

A Day in the Life of Mithila (video 53 minutes, in French) by Yves Vequaud. 1974. Available from Yves Vequaud, 121 Avenue Parmentier, Paris 75011, France.

Five Painters (video 55 minutes, color, sound) on the lives of five Mithila painters (Ganga Devi, Sita Devi, Krishnanad Jha, Shanti Devi and Baua Devi) 1982. . Co-directed by Raymond Owens, Ron Hess, and Cheryl Groff. Available from South Asia Film Program, University of Wisconsin, Madison, Wisconsin, 53706. tel: (608) 255-0533

Munni (video, 28 minutes, color, sound) of a young girl learning to paint. 1981. Co-directed by Raymond Owns, Ron Hess, and Cheryl Groff. Available from South Asia Film Program, University of Wisconsin, Madison, Wisconsin, 53706. tel: (608) 255-0533

Fourteen short films with a German Manual and English summaries by Erika Moser. 1973-78. Available from Mrs Elke Geilhaupt, e-mail: elke.geilhaupt@iwf.de Documentation dept. / Infotheque - IWF Wissen und Medien gGmbH Nonnenstieg 72 - D-37075 Göngen. tel.: (++49 551) 50 24-3 34, Fax ++49 551 / 50 24-408;

UNESCO video, 1990s

Hasegawa, Tokio. Two videos detailing the paintings of Ganga Devi and several other Mithila painters 1990s (in Japanese)

Appendix C

A Preliminary List of Useful and Important Potential Research Projects Regarding Mithila Painting

The geographic extent of the Mithila painting tradition(s) . commercialized on paper and for ritual purposes on walls and floors, by caste or community. Current knowledge is largely of the painting traditions in the villages in and around Madhubani town. How far does it extend, and how does it vary, to the East, West, North, and South? Which castes are painting, what kinds of paintings, and on what occasions? How do styles, subjects, iconography, etc, vary across the wider region . including southern Nepal?
How has the commercialization of painting on paper (and cloth) affected the economic life of the painters and their families? How is the income from paintings being distributed within the family and beyond, by gender, and how is it being used?
What effect is the commercialization of the painting tradition having on traditional gender relations within the painter.s families, and in their communities and villages? Is it having an effect on dowry payments, schooling for girls, and conflict over authority in the family, etc.? Do these effects differ by caste or community?
How has the marketing and commercialization of the tradition affected the imagery, styles of painting, iconography, and subjects of the paintings? How have the traditions evolved, changed, expanded, or developed variations in the different villages, castes, and communities, especially as men enter a tradition traditionally assigned to women?
How do women and men of different villages, ages, castes, and communities make judgments regarding the quality of paintings? What makes a good (or bad) painting by local criteria?
Across the wider region, who are the painters, where are they, and how many are there doing commercial painting? And who, and how many, are doing the traditional wall and floor painting? In effect, is it possible to construct a large-scale Directory or data base of painters (with brief cvs)? It would certainly be extremely useful for promotional, marketing, and research purposes.
To what extent are previously distinct caste or village styles or subject matters being adopted by painters of different castes and villages? Does this in any respect represent a decline is caste divisions in other domains? How do members of one caste regard the use of their traditional subjects, styles, or techniques by members of other castes?
Past attention has been almost entirely on painting by Brahmins, Kayasths, and Dusadhs. Do none of the other local castes paint commercially . or on walls and floors or elsewhere? If so, why have they been overlooked, and how do their painting traditions relate to the more familiar ones? What, for example, has become of Mali painting? Likewise, did/do Chamars ever paint?
What is the history of Godana (.tattoo.) painting? When did it start, who initiated it? Why is it associated with Harijan painters? Who constitutes the market for the Godana paintings?
What kinds of influence on the painting tradition, subject matter, styles, iconography, techniques, awards, marketing assistance, etc., has resulted from Government sponsored training programs and other political or economic and social development efforts?
How are the different types of paintings being marketed . through melas, dealers, Emporia, ngos, to Indians, tourists, and museums? What are the expenses involved, and who is accumulating the profits? Are the painters - as some claim - being .exploited. by the dealers? How can profits to the painters be increased and marketing of the paintings be improved and expanded?
As many of the Dusadh painters draw on images and episodes in the life of Lord Sahesh and his companions, it would be extremely useful for folklorists or oral historians to systematically collect and publish the Dusadh folklore or legends on these figures. The oral traditions of other castes might also be systematically collected and published.
It would also be extremely valuable to follow the urging of the late great folklorist, translator, and poet, A. K. Ramanujan, to collect all of the folklore, legends, epics, etc. among all the castes in a single village. The goals would be to gain a sense of the full wealth of images and ideas the painters (and others) might draw on, and more broadly, to encourage cross-caste or community recognition and exchange.
As much of the wider painting tradition is related to marriage rituals, it would be extremely useful to collect detailed accounts of these rituals from a wide variety of different castes, communities, and villages, in order to complement the reasonably complete material available on the Brahmin and Kayasth marriage rituals in the villages immediately around Madhubani.
How, and to what extent, have the painters and the paintings been influenced in the subject matter, techniques, and aesthetics by external images and ideas, ranging from calendar and other popular art forms, films, TV, and videos, to overseas experience in Japan, Europe, and the United States?