Is saving an art form actually transforming it?

Once sacred, seasonal and done on mud walls, Sohrai and Khovar art is now inked on to paper and sold to tourists, raising quiet questions about what preservation really means

- SANDIP ROY

Malo Devi with a painting of her signature tiger.

(SANDIP ROY)

The ground rules for exploring prehistoric cave paintings are simple: "If you come across any baby goats, you cannot pick one up and take home, no matter how cute.

My friend Milena continues sternly. "It will be a huge hassle for Gustav to drive all the way back here to return it."

Gustav Imam, our guide to the tribal art of Hazaribag in Jharkhand, smiles. "Also gents toilet to the left," continues Milena. "Ladies to the right."

Left on the hill slope means sal trees. Right is more sal trees. As we trot off in our respective directions into the forest, it occurs to me this art exploration trip was going to be rather different from a visit to the National Gallery of Modern Art (NGMA), Delhi.

I had first encountered the Sohrai folk art of Jharkhand at an NGMA show in Kolkata. The artist Putli Devi had filled an entire wall with the striking images of animals and birds-a striped serpent drinking milk from the udders of a cow, a mongoose attacking a snake, cats who seemed to be dancing holding hands. The animals painted in red, black, white and yellow were ordinary creatures but rendered fantastical by her artistry.

That's when I heard that in villages near Hazaribag, the walls of the mud houses are covered with these images after harvests and before weddings. The pigments came from local soils like white kaolin clay and black manganese clay. The images were not so much painted as scratched into a layer of wet clay applied on the mud wall. The "brushes" were nothing more than broken combs. It sounded fascinating. It was one thing to see these paintings in a gallery. I wanted to see them in their natural habitat.