Baua Devi Explained

Baua Devi
Birth Place:Jitwarpur, Mahubani district, Bihar
Style:Mithila or Madhubani painting
Awards:Padma Shri (2017), National Award (1984)

Baua Devi is a Mithila painting artist from Jitwarpur village of Madhubani District in Bihar. Mithila painting is an ancient folk art that originated in the region. It is recognized as a series of complex geometric and linear patterns traced on the walls of a house's inner chambers. It was later transferred to handmade paper and canvases.[1] Baua Devi won the National Award in 1984 and received the Padma Shri in 2017.

Biography

Baua Devi has been practising the Mithila art form for almost 60 years.[2] She got married at the age of 12, and was encouraged by her mother-in-law to pursue painting. In 1966, Pupul Jayakar, then director of the All India Handicrafts Board, an advisory body of the Ministry of textiles, sent Mumbai artist Bhaskar Kulkarni to Madhubani to find art and artists. Baua Devi was a teenager when she met Kulkarni and was the youngest of the group of artists who formally transferred Mithila art from walls, where it was traditionally practised as mural art, to paper. Bhaskar Kulkarni took their works to museums and later encouraged Baua Devi to come to the National Crafts Museum. She was paid Rs.1.50 per painting for the first year that she worked for Kulkarni.[3] Her work has since travelled to galleries and museums in Spain, France and Japan.[4] In 2015, one of her paintings was gifted by Prime Minister Narendra Modi to the Mayor of Hanover, Stefan Schosstok on his visit to India.[5]

Style

Over the past five decades, Madhubani art has grown in prominence and Baua Devi's work has won critical acclaim—she was the only woman artist from India to show at the Magiciens de la Terre in 1989 at the Centre Pompidou.[6] Her work ranges in scale from a small sheet of paper to murals up to 20 feet high.[7] Her paintings tell the mythological stories of Lord Krishna and Ram and Sita, while emphasising on Sita's narrative of the story.[8] Baua Devi uses handmade paper and natural colours for her paintings, predominantly using black, yellow, red and white in her palette.[9] [10]

Awards

Notes and References

  1. Book: Thakur, Upendra . Madhubani Painting . Abhinav Publications . 2003 . 9788170171560 . New Delhi . en . Google Books.
  2. Web site: 3 February 2017 . Baua Devi of Jitwarpur village gets Padmashree award . dead . https://web.archive.org/web/20190327085914/http://local.mithilaconnect.com/news/1077-baua-devi-of-jitwarpur-village-gets-padmashree-award . 27 March 2019 . 18 March 2019 . MithilaConnect Local . en-US.
  3. Web site: Kalra . Vandana . 14 October 2012 . Painting on the Wall . subscription . live . https://web.archive.org/web/20240625023826/https://indianexpress.com/article/news-archive/web/painting-on-the-wall/ . 25 June 2024 . 18 March 2019 . The Indian Express.
  4. Web site: Artist - Baua Devi . live . https://web.archive.org/web/20230216071614/https://artiana.com/Artist/Baua-Devi . 16 February 2023 . 18 March 2019 . Artiana.
  5. Web site: Chaudhary . Pranav . 15 April 2015 . PM Modi gifts Bihar artist's painting to Hannover mayor . live . https://web.archive.org/web/20230216072950/https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/patna/PM-Modi-gifts-Bihar-artists-painting-to-Hannover-mayor/articleshow/46926964.cms . 16 February 2023 . 18 March 2019 . The Times of India.
  6. Web site: Baua Devi - Sita Harana (Abduction of Sita) . live . https://web.archive.org/web/20220321034449/https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/auction/2022/modern-contemporary-south-asian-art/sita-harana-abduction-of-sita . 21 March 2022 . 24 June 2024 . . en.
  7. Web site: Artist - Baua Devi . live . https://web.archive.org/web/20240303132021/https://indigoarts.com/artists/baua-devi . 3 March 2024 . 24 June 2024 . Indigo Arts Gallery.
  8. Web site: Rinder . Lawrence . Lawrence Rinder . 1997 . Baua Devi and the Art of Mithila / MATRIX 175 . live . https://web.archive.org/web/20230926120217/https://bampfa.org/program/baua-devi-and-art-mithila-matrix-175 . 26 September 2023 . 24 June 2024 . . en.
  9. Web site: 26 March 2019 . Behind Painted Walls: The Story of Baua Devi & Mithila Painting . live . https://web.archive.org/web/20231208214722/https://sarmaya.in/spotlight/behind-painted-walls-the-story-of-baua-devi-mithila-painting/ . 8 December 2023 . 24 June 2024 . . en-US.
  10. Web site: Loudon . Sarah . 2012 . Past Exhibitions - Women's Paintings From the Land of Sita . live . https://web.archive.org/web/20231002090928/https://www.seattleartmuseum.org/Exhibitions/Details?EventId=24368 . 2 October 2023 . 24 June 2024 . Seattle Art Museum.
  11. Web site: In . Ji . 19 August 2022 . Object of the Week: Kali . live . https://web.archive.org/web/20230923173201/https://samblog.seattleartmuseum.org/2022/08/baua-devi-kali/ . 23 September 2023 . 24 June 2024 . . en-US.
  12. Web site: 31 March 2017 . President Mukherjee confers Padmi Shri to Madhubani artist Baua Devi . live . https://web.archive.org/web/20230216093435/https://www.newindianexpress.com/nation/2017/Mar/31/president-mukherjee-confers-padmi-shri-to-madhubani-artist-baua-devi-1588131.html . 16 February 2023 . 18 March 2019 . The New Indian Express.

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Baua Devi".

Except where otherwise indicated, Everything.Explained.Today is © Copyright 2009-2024, A B Cryer, All Rights Reserved. Cookie policy.