After nearly two years, I finally took a three day vacation to visit Bhubaneshwar and Puri in Orissa. It had been in my wish list for several years and it finally happened this time, albeit at the last moment. There was a lot of panicking regarding Covid protocols, hotel cancellations till the last moment leaving no time to plan the itinerary. However, things came together organically as we (my mom and I) met some really nice people on the way. While the trip deserves several posts, I thought that I will begin by writing a bit about the Puri part of the trip and the craft of Pattachitra.
Puri Tour
Pronounced Poori (not unlike the fried bread poori which is a staple here), Puri is a must see place in India. Any Puri trip will have three parts to it. The religious part with visiting the Puri Jagannath temple, Sakhi Gopal temple among other temples, the craft part that includes excursions to Pipli applique work village and Raghurajpur artist village and finally the nature part that is visiting the beaches in the area and going on an excursion to lake Chilika. Since both my mom and I are artsy folks, we prioritised the first two as we had only 2 days in Puri.
There are several legends and myths that link the Jagannath temple and the craft of pattachitra. Let me share a few of them here.
Jagannath and Pattachitra
The primary three deities of Jagannath temple are made up of wood and hence “fall sick” when bathed. According to a local lore they take 15 days to recover and the main shrine is closed for worship during this period. Instead a painting of the 3 deities in pattachitra style called Anasar patti is put up so that the devotees who come to the temple can see a form of the deities. Another story states that when devotees from far and near came to visit the temple, they wanted to take a likeliness of the deities back. Those days there were no readymade souvenirs. Therefore, images of Jagannath were made on cloth canvases as “Yatri patti”, created from old cotton fabric and sold to pilgrims and travellers. Soon they became quite popular with the natives as well.
Even today there are several people in Puri who visit the temple atleast once a day to glace upon the face of Lord Jagannath. Being away from the land and the temple makes them sad. This was the case centuries ago too, when the natives of Puri would miss their Lord while travelling elsewhere. Therefore, the paintings were made on portable shrines that could be carried around during travel. The paintings were also engraved on yellowed palm leaves (Tala Pattachitra – leaf painting) which would be stitched together, so that they can be gathered, tied and taken along without much wear and tear to the painting. All the three forms of this art form exist at the present and have given rise to more design variations such as painted bottles, gourds, and leaf paintings with cuts
The craft of Pattachitra
I believe pattachitra to be a truly sustainable craft. At the present, the paintings are created on a cloth canvas. The canvas is prepared by gluing two layers of old cotton sarees together using a tamarind gum. It is then coated in a mixture of chalk powder, tamarind seeds, and resin gum and polished until it becomes like a sheet of paper. The forms are hand drawn and painting using brushes and natural paints.
The colours are derived from stones and mixed with natural cum in coconut shells so that they don not dry up in the process of painting explains Master Mittu Ji, the artist I met at Raghurajpur village. The artists use five natural colours – white, yellow, red, blue and black, though they do mix other colours using these five. While some artists still follow the tradition of using black for an evil character, yellow for female characters and such, most of them use the colours as they see fit to create an enhanced visual appeal.
The differentiating factor of pattachitra is the super fine lines and miniature images on the painting. Also, the faces of characters have long noses, prominent chins and elongated eyes with faces typically being in profile. While a pattachitra (painting on cloth) can have a single image, it is typically a scroll painting. Each painting tells one or more stories and the sequences of scenes is very important. You need to know the right order in which to “read” (look at) the painting in order to understand the story.
Raghurajpur
About 15kms from Puri is the heritage village of Raghurajpur. In the late 1990’s the pattachitra artists who live in this village received grants from the Indian National Trust for Art and Cultural Heritage (INTACH) to paint their houses so as to display their craft to the world both on the walls of their houses and sell their wares. Tourists flocked to see the village (of around 120 houses) and creating a steady of revenue for the artists. However, over time the images faded and tourists stopped visiting during the pandemic. However, once again they received funds to repaint their houses with newer motifs and scenes. What you see in the video is the amalgamation of the two. Check out my reel on Instagram to take a virtual walk through the heritage village of Raghurajpur.
While several families have lived here for many generations and belong to the Mahapatra caste of artistes, they are those who train under these hereditary craftspeople and settle here or in Puri and practice their craft. One such person is Mr. Abinash Sahoo, who I met on Facebook and become my friend and guide on this trip.
This village is also famous for the acrobatic Gotipua dance where young boys dress like girls and perform a mesmerising dance. We were lucky enough to meet Guru Gangadhar Nayak and Jitendra Nayak and watch a rehearsal. I also saw the jewellery that they wear for both Gotipua and Odissi dance. Now that deserves a separate post.
Pattachitra on Fabric – Pattachitralaya
If you love Pattachitra and want to wear it on your body then Pattachitralya in Puri is the place to go. Here each piece of handwoven fabric, be it for a saree, a dupatta, a blouse or kurta is carefully painted under the watchful eyes of Abinash Sahoo and Paritosh Sahoo – brothers who run the art business. I contacted Abinash before my trip to order a kurta and we started talking. At 26 he runs three units and employs more than 25 people whom he has personally trained.
We met in Pipli where Abinash and Paritosh took us to market. Then once again, along with their younger brother gave us a personal tour of Puri Jagannath mandir for a night darshan. Not only that, Abinash accompanied us to Raghurajpur where we met his teachers and got a private showing of both Pattachitra drawing as well as Gotipua dance. The Puri trip wouldn’t have been great without him. The brothers of Pattachitralaya are truly the gems of Puri.
Shopping at Puri
I hope I enjoyed the seeing the craft of pattachitra in this virtual tour. With this you would have realised that Puri is a great place to shop. Apart from pattachitra paintings which are pieces of art and therefore appropriate priced you can also buy several kinds of home decor objects – masks, scrolls, shrines, charms, bookmarks, painted gourds, bottles and keychains at Raghurapur. Orissa is famous for several weaves such as Sambalpuri ikat, Begumpura patta, Pasapalli ikat, Bomkai ikat and more all named after the districts of Orissa they are woven in. Orissa is also famous for its silver filigree or Tarkasi jewellery, conch bangles and fantastic tribal ornaments (which you can see not buy) in another post on the Tribal museum in Bubhaneshawar – the state’s capital.
PS: Since I migrated the blog, I have been experience errors while uploading images. Hence I did not post for over two weeks. If any of you are experiencing any glitches, please inform me and I will try and correct them. Until then, stay safe and an advanced Happy New year.
I hope you find it interesting
Cheers
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