Bhula Bhai, the Painter of a Legacy

A classic black and white photograph of sheets of fabric spread out to dry along the sandy bed of the river. The single frame is like a balanced painting. The photographer was Cartier Bresson and the picture was a vision of this textile city. The image depicted ‘Mata ni Pachedi’ drying in the sun after being washed in the river Sabarmati. The ‘Mata-ni-Pachedi is a part of Ahmedabad’s living heritage. It is a ‘kalamkari’ textile art form. It differs from the other similar painted Indian fabrics as it depicts various aspects of the Mother Goddess as the central image. This is the work of the Chitara community.

Bhulabhai Chitara is an unassuming, short, balding soft-spoken man. His eyes though are dark and deep and his dexterous hands work like magic while painting on fabric. Bhulabhai is a traditional ‘Pachedi painter’ and the oldest in the last remaining Chitara family in Ahmedabad. Most of the extended family stays in Vasna. As the afternoon sun wears on, Bhulabhai sits painting, generating an aura of calm around him. He is surrounded by the squalor and noise of dogs, running children, shouts, cooking smoke and all that makes up a meshed human settlement. Yet he sits serene, his hands holding a sharpened neem twig, dipping it now and then in a black paste, whipping up narrative stories on the fabric before him. The man’s uncanny sense of balance and form is brilliant and he recollects each story behind the images that he is drawing.

Bhulabhais hands shirk there working as he talks of the legends regarding the origin of his community. They and only they have been blessed by the mother goddess to depict her image on fabric. The Pachedi is commissioned by people from diverse communities having the same social status such as Bharwads, Rabaris, Targalas, Naiks et al. specially during the twice yearly festival of Navratri. A Mata-ni-Pachedi eulogizes a particular aspect of the mother goddess, each aspect is invoked and the relevant Pachedi commissioned for a particular propitious reason. As Bhula bhai outlines his figures he continues his conversation. Both activities operate on their independent planes, the traditional Pachedi he says, utilized three colors, black, a dark maroon and the white of the background cloth. Each color had a specific importance and place. The whole process of making the Pachedi is seeped in ritual as it has a deep religious resonance and is an offering to the patron mother goddess. Even the handing over of a completed Pachedi and its later unveiling is a ceremonial ritual. These ceremonies are themselves illustrated within the Pachedi thus apart from a central, religious perspective, the Pachedi is also a data bank containing legends, folk tales, scenes from daily life, enactment of rituals and the stuff of oral history. Earlier three Pachedi with a canopy on top to form an enclosed space served as mobile temple for nomadic communities on the move. Even though the people roam no more the rituals surrounding a Pachedi are still enacted. Musicians and bards highlight a particular image within the painting and sing and spin their tales.

Bhula bhai works entirely with natural dyes, the black is the fermented solution of iron dust and jaggery. While the maroon is derived from the plants root majith. The image of the mother goddess is always drawn in by the male of the family, while the women help by filling in the color. The pre-mordanding, the lyrical ness of washing off the excessive dye in flowing river water is along with the drawing the job of the male member of the household. All this while Bhula Bhais imagery on fabric is in progress and he explains the intrinsic composition of the drawing. The Pachedi has as its central image the mother goddess riding her relevant mount and ensconced within a two dimensional replica of a temple structure. Around this central imagery is illustrated an entire pictoral history, peppered in myths of the community. Its is indeed a living document which can be unraveled and decoded by future generations.

The evening shadows have lengthend as Bhula Bhai completes his narrative. He is indeed an artist and a master craftsman who has been honored in festivals abroad and is a recipient of the Gurushilpa award in his own right. His three sons, Chandrakanth, Kiran and Vikram are National Awardees and keenly furthering the legacy of their forefathers. Thus are master pieces created amidst such apparent squalor, surmounted by whiffs of cooking fires and wafting wisps of fermenting dyes.

Published: Ahmedabad Mirror