Page 8 - Art and Crafts of Bangladesh

PAINTING 5

through the partition of India, East and West Pakistan were established and in the year
1971 Bangladesh was born. As a result, in the quest for the painting tradition of
Bangladesh, or at the same instance, its culture and heritage the unity centered on the
language of the people of this region is very important. Therefore, in the discussion of
the paintings of Bangladesh, Bengal denotes the area of Eastern India or South Asia
where the language of the majority of the people is Bengali.
It is very difficult to date the antiquity of Bengal’s art of painting. This is because
notable examples of ancient paintings of this region are rarely found. The weather,
climate and the impermanence of the art media are some causes responsible for this.
As a result it has not been possible to decide exactly when the painting of Bengal
originated. From the specimens of art works found, no painting has been identified
in palm leaf, wood, parchment or cloth from before the 10th century. Actually, the
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earliest specimens of painting of Bengal are the religious miniatures of the Buddhist
Viharas of the Pala age (750-1162 AD). In approximately 983 AD during the reign
of the Pala king Mahipala I, 12 colored Buddhist paintings were executed in the
palm leaf manuscript of the Ashtasahasrika-Prajnaparamita, in the Nalanda
Mahavihara. Judging from the style of paintings, these pictures belong to the same
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group as the best examples of Indian classical art, the wall paintings of Ajanta.
Contextually it is presumed that these are not the primary instances of the art of
painting of Bengal and that the tradition of the art of painting had been in existence
from earlier times. It may be mentioned that it was during the rule of the Pala kings
that there originated and developed the Bengali national entity as a political force in
India. The painting of Bengal of the pre-Pala age may be considered as unknown or fig. 1.1
forgotten to history. Although no specimen of painting worth the mention can be Two potsherds found at
found from that chapter, productions of many different associated arts like the Pandurajar Dhibi
ornamentation of clay vessels found as archaeological specimens provide an indirect
idea of the paintings of those times.

The Pre-Pala Period
The most ancient evidence of human civilization in Bengal has been discovered in the
Pandurajar Dhibi in Burdwan district of West Bengal. Here household utensils have
been found of a type used by a people similar to the Harappan civilization. The most
ancient specimens of the painting of the people of Bengal are the various designs
drawn on pottery found at Pandurajar Dhibi. These designs mainly record the
particulars of the pottery artists’ pictorial skills. But in this context special mention
should be made of some black ware on the surface of which are line drawings incised
in white. On one fragment there is a drawing of a row of fishes at the edge of a pattern
similar to a fishing net, in another fragment there is represented a snake-like animal
held in the beak of a peacock (fig.1.1). 7