Patua Paintings

The Patua is a community found in West Bengal. Some Patuas are Hindus, while others are Muslims and Buddhists. The paintings tradition of Patuas was started as a village tradition as painters of scrolls or pats telling the popular mangal stories of the gods and goddesses. The Patua painters or scroll painters have gone from village to village with their scrolls or pat singing stories in return for money or food. These pats or scrolls are made of sheets of paper of equal or different sizes which are sown together and painted with ordinary poster paints.

Project: Tagore Tells and the Patua Paints

“Tagore Tells and the Patua Paints” is a project that enables the reinterpretation of Tagore’s texts by the chitrakars or patua artists. The 1,000-year-old tradition of patua has been roped in to depict a few children’s short stories and poems of the bard through patua paintings. The chosen texts are Tota- Kahini or The Parrot’s Tale (a tale in prose), Birpurush or The Hero (a small boy’s fantasy in verse about an adventure), Diner alo nibhe elo or Daylight is Fading (a poem describing a rainy sunset) and Brishti pore tapur tupur (rain falls drop by drop). (The Hindu)