Text: Parvathy Baul & Sundar Ramanathaiyer Photos: Ravi Gopalan Nair Design: Bhattathiri Back cover: Trivandrum

Ektara Festival 2012 Limited Edition Published by aim arts initiative, Kolkata Printed in Kolkata

Ekatara Kalari, Nedumangad, Trivandrum 695 541 email: raviparvathy@yahoo.com

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Catalogue of the exhibition of paintings based on Baul storytelling ~ ChitraKatha Geeti at Bengal Art Gallery, Ho Chi Min Sarani, Kolkata 5th -11th January 2013 11am-7pm Organized by aim art initiative and Karigar Haat Collaborative Partner ICCR, Kolkata

ChitraKatha+
y the grace of my Gurus, I have been a student of Baul for the last twenty years. My first interaction with the Baul tradition was in Shantiniketan where I was a student of Painting at Kalabhavan. Those days, I would spent long hours sketching Baul Sadhakas at the Baul festivals, Akharas and the Sadhu gatherings at the Smashan. I was drawn into their music and lifestyle; I wanted to know more about the magic of unconditional love that was conveyed to me through every Baul song I heard, and from every meeting with Baul Sadhakas. I was eager to be a part of the large space of `Baul Parampara which can embrace everyone and everything with empathy and compassion.

first entered the world of Baul as a painter. It took me several years to go deep into the Sadhana of Baul and become a Baul singer incorporating music, dance, voice and my whole being in union with Bhava. Having given up most of my habits for the sake of achieving perfection in the Baul practice, what remained were

Sanatan Baba reading the ChitraKatha painting ~ (Chittore House, Trivandrum, 2003)4

mostly images which came to me while singing ~ those images in the story of Radha and Krishna. Slowly images took the shape of ChitraKatha. I should admit here that the passion for painting was much stronger in me as a child than music. Music came much later. There were times when I used to spend long hours studying birds, trees, insects, rivers and the human life around. Stories with pictures always fascinated me, and so did the graphic novels we would get as gifts. engal has a long tradition of storytelling of Ramayana and Mahabharatha. Yet, storytelling flourished most during the Vaishnava period through Padavali Leela Kirtan. The simple love epics of Radha and Krishna are sung even today from dusk to dawn, and the stories transcend all the borders of mind and self-consciousness, elevating the spectators into a pure inner experience of Bhakti. At times, the spectators also experience the `Ashta Swatika Bhava. I had spent long hours listening to the `Padavali Leela Kirtan at the Vaishnava festivals in Burdwan, Murshidabad and Cooch Bihar. I was captivated by the ability of storytellers to generate a unique experience for
Rupanurag 1 ~ Radha before meeting Krishna and the poet Chandidas 4 6

the spectators who already knew the story from beginning to end. At the same time, I was amazed at the transformative power of a simple story. any may not be aware that Baul has a specific genre of storytelling known as `Leela Tatwa, much inspired from the Padavali Leela Kirtan. Baul sang the life stories of great Baul Sadhakas like Chandidas, Bilwamangal, Jayadeva, Vidyapati. Both my Gurus - Sanatan Das Baul and Shashanko Goshai - gave me the repertoire of Baul storytelling. They inspired me to be inquisitive and innovative. I loved the stories they taught me, and I would paint those stories and show it to my Gurus, who would go through every detail of the story-paintings and give opinions. They both thoroughly enjoyed `reading my paintings All these became fairly relevant in my later years when I wanted to perform these stories to a large number of spectators from different languages and cultures. These paintings served as a bridge between us, offering an open space of universal visual language of communication. s I had a clear musical concept with Baul poems written by the Sadhakas, I had

Rupanurag 2 ~ Radha watching the reflection of Krishna in the river Yamuna 4 8

to find a name. To create dramaturgy in a performance-like situation, at times I had to compose songs. I named my work as ChitraKatha Geethi. I started painting the stories in simple sequential narratives, using bright colors, which I felt represented the Baul songs I sing. I really wanted to paint using natural colors; but since I was planning to travel around with the paintings, they had to be durable and able to withstand the traumas of long travels. I used acrylic on canvas. hitra means picture (paintings, drawings, sketches, doodles etc.) which every child loves to draw, and Katha means story, which every child loves to listen to. Geethi signifies songs. ChitraKatha Geethi, of course, is the art of telling/singing stories with pictures (mostly sequential art, with or without words, as in temple Mural paintings, cartoons, comics, graphic novels etc.). When the paintings came into the Baul story-telling, everything seemed to change. It was different from my earlier performances. Along with the singing and dancing, the colorful world of paintings devoid of words seamlessly integrated into the performance. I felt that storytelling got transformed into mono-theatre. At times, I became the character in the story.
10 Rupanurag 3 ~ Enchanted Radha on her way to the divine flute player 4

have been working and exploring the possibilities of ChitraKatha Geethi for the last 14 years, and it has undergone quite a few transformations. I have also tried to perform outside the Baul array of stories. his is my first exhibition of ChitraKatha Geethi in Bengal. Since picture storytelling is an integral part of Bengali life, I am very happy to share my work and ChitraKatha Geethi experience with you. Joy Guru Lets hear every story. Let other stories become ours. May our stories be ONE. With love and regards,

Parvathy Baul Kolkata, 5th Jan 2013

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Rupanurag 4 ~ The departure 4

About Sung Paintings or Cantastoria ChitraKatha Geethi

There nowhere is or has been people without narrativeit is simply there like life itself.
-Roland Barthes

icture-story recitation, although as old as the hills, is also as new as yesterday. The verbal narrative with paintings exists even today in all cultures across the globe.

According to the scholars and researchers, Indian tradition of storytelling accompanied by painted scrolls can be traced back to at least the second century BC and is known to have existed almost all over the subcontinent. Sinologist and scholar Victor Mair traces the roots of picture story performance to India, where he mentions - a low order of Brahmins called Devalkar made a living by carrying paintings of Gods from door to door, singing about the powers and attributes of these Gods, and begging for charity. Mair cites numerous references to particular kinds of picture scrolls in India from the 6th century, for example, the `Yamapattaka which display pictures probably on cloth scrolls or hanging [vertical] [and who sung] of the rewards
14 Rupanurag 5 ~ Celebrating Rasaleela in the full moon 4

and punishments to be experienced in the realm of Yama, God of the Underworld. Yamapattaka is even today performed by the Patuas and Santal tribe artists of Bengal. References also appear in political tracts of the time to spies disguising themselves as picture showmen in order to travel freely. Indeed, from this very early mention of picture storytelling, the performers are characterized as disreputable, underprivileged, and nomadic vagrants who made their living from their pictures.

espite this association with illegitimacy, the stories performed were religious and their subject matter divine. The narrator of the `Par (a later form of Indian picture story recitation) was called the `Bhopa, a word meaning priest for a minor folk deity. The Bhopa sang the narration while his assistant (often his wife) held an oil lamp and illuminated the relevant part of the picture. The paintings themselves were thought to have special properties. It was believed that to sleep in the same room with a powerful scroll could heal the sick or the infirm. Paintings were passed from generation to generation, as were the songs and the knowledge of how to sing them. Indian picture-story performance then travelled through Central Asia with the spread of Manichaeism and Buddhism into China, where it became `Pien, `Pao-Chuan, and `Layang-Pien. It
16 Swargapattaka (Heaven) and Yamapattaka (Hell) 4

also spread to Indonesia, becoming `Wayang Beber - usually long, horizontally-oriented painted scrolls, unrolled while a narrator spoke and sung to explain the illustration. From China, picture-story performance spread to Japan, becoming the `Etoki. Mair tells us that picture-story telling travelled through Persia, where it was called `Parde-dar or `Pardezan in Iran, and on into Europe at least in the middle ages. By the 12th century in Southern Italy, painted illuminated scrolls were performed with sung prayer or narrative recitation - known as Cantastoria. Cantastoria is an Italian word for the ancient performance form of picture-story recitation, which involves sung narration accompanied by reference to painted banners, scrolls, or placards. It is a tradition belonging to the underdog, to chronically itinerant people of low social status, yet also inextricably linked to the sacred. It is a practice very much alive today, existing in a wide variety of incarnations around the world, and fulfilling very diverse functions for different populations. n the early 16th century `Cantambanco appeared in Italy. Cantambanco means bench singer, as the travelling performer would stand above the crowd on a little bench, singing and pointing to his pictures with a stick. In Germany, the `Bankelsanger (bench singer) and the
18 Churning of the ocean and Rahu swallowing sun & moon 4

`Strassensanger (street singer) performed `Moritat, which might refer to the sensationalistic nature of these increasingly secular stories, often taking murder, natural disasters and sordid tales of revenge as their subjects. In Spain, the picture-story performer was called `Cantor de Feria and the picture story itself known as `Retablo de las Maravillas, tableau (or picture) of marvels. In France, the performer was known as `Le Chanteur de cantiques or `Crieur de journeaux. With the advent of the printing press, these European performers produced broadsheets which included verse from their songs and sometimes reproductions of the pictures as well, that they sold after the performances. The Australian aboriginal bark paintings also represent their history and these history-telling pictures are taken as powerful entities. he form has recently found new life and a growing population of aficionados in North America, particularly among puppeteers, artists, and activists, many of them influenced over the years by the work of The Bread and Puppet Theatre. Bread and Puppets director, Peter Schumann, saw Bankelsang as a child growing up in Germany, and later encountered Cantastoria in Italy as a young man. Picture-story telling appears in Bread
20 Parvathy painting her first colored ChitraKatha 4

and Puppet productions in various guises and in many different contexts. Most often it appears with European-style features: painted or woodcutprint banners (rather than horizontal scrolls); a solo narrator accompanied by western musical instrument(s), and banners often with several pictures enclosed in rectangular frames on each page, looking much like a comicbook or story-board. However, although the basic characteristics of Cantastoria are preserved here, over the years Bread and Puppet Theatre has developed a rich and varied Cantastoria style, all of its own. Often Schumann chooses to make the form expansive, and structures the Cantastoria such that large groups of people can learn to participate and perform Cantastoria quickly and easily. This is made possible by organizing participants into two groups or `choruses on either side of the paintings, and assigning them simple musical and movement tasks which they perform in unison, to punctuate the solo narrators delivery. erhaps having longest history, picture storytelling is very much alive in contemporary India as well. Pabujeer Bhopa has received international acclamation, and is still performed with all its splendor as part of Rajasthani family rituals, and outside the traditional context in festivals and performance spaces both nationally and internationally.
22 First Chitrakatha at Bread and Puppet Theater (Vermont, 2000)4

The Patua of Bengal despite hard economic times is still flourishing and a large number of women of the Patua community keep the tradition alive. With the contribution of art lovers and workers, several Patua painters have received international acclamation and Pata exhibition and performances are held across the globe. The old Hamzanama storytelling has almost vanished; the paintings are kept in different collections all over the world; new paintings have not been created. However, the tradition of telling Dastaan has recently returned to its practice, and is gaining much popularity among the Urdu speaking community around the world. Pictures become breathing characters, singers become inspirers and encouragers, and everyday citizens become active participants in the making of their own culture~
eferences: Mair, Victor H. Painting and Performance: Chinese Picture Recitation and its Indian Genesis. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1988 Donal, Clare. Museum of Everyday Life, Vermont , USA 2010 Jain, Jyotindra. Picture Showmen: Insights into the Narrative Tradition in Indian Art, Marg Publication, 1998 Seyller, John. The Adventures of Hamza, Painting and Storytelling in Mughal India, Washington, DC, 2002

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Baul story trilogy at Beirut, Lebanon (2001) 4

arvathy Baul
(from the mystic singer performer tradition of West Bengal) PARVATHY BAUL (Mousumi Parial; born 1976) from West Bengal, now lives and works in Trivandrum, Kerala since 1997. During her study at Kalabhavan, Shantiniketan she was introduced to the Baul and got initiated. Parvathy Baul sings and dances with minimal use of Baul instruments like Duggie, Ektara and Nupur all played by herself. She inherited this style from the Parampara of Shri Sanatan Das Baul (Bankura District, who followed the style of the legendary Baul singer-practitioner Shri Nitai Khapa) and Shri Shashanko Goshai (from the Gurukul of the acclaimed singer-practitioner Shri Vrindavan Goshai and Shri Nityananda Goshai of Mushidabad), who left his body at the age of 100 in March 2006. For over a period of fourteen years she has been travelling to meet masters of Bengal music traditions as a part of her search for Baul songs and its practice. She practices various disciplines of painting, print making, theatre, dance, art of storytelling, folksongs of Bengal, and yoga. Parvathy did her first story-telling performance at Bread and Puppet Theatre in Vermont,USA, where she was profoundly inspired by the works of Peter
26 Slaying of the demon Rahu at No Theatre Japan (2005) 4

Schuman. After this, she soon worked on her next performance and was invited to perform in Lebanon. Her first performance of ChitraKatha Geethi in Europe was at Ethno Museum in Geneva and later at the Festival de lImaginaire in Paris. She was invited by Rietburg Museum, Zurich, to recreate the stories of Hamzanama based on the original works of Hamzanama painters from the Mughal period. Parvathy has performed ChitraKatha Geethi giving workshops in several countries. She has performed ChitraKatha Geethi in Trivandrum, Kolkata, Pondicherry and Auroville. She has exhibited ChitraKatha Geethi in Trivandrum (2002) at Rietburg Museum Zurich (2003) and at Ethno Museum Geneva (2011). She has created a new series of stories based on Rupanurag for the Ethno Museum, Geneva. Parvathy does woodcuts inspired by the metaphors of Baul songs. She collaborates with Ravi Gopalan Nair for carving and printing. All her woodcut prints are limited editions.

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Radha Bhav, Trivandrum (2011) 4

My stories so far are: Stories of Baul: Trilogy - The Womb, Chandidas and Kalia The Secret Womb Story of Sage Shukadev Radha Bhav Hamzanama: The Story of Prophet Ilias Hamzanama: The Defeat of Emperor Zumrud Shah The Slaying of Demon Rahu Rupanurag The plates printed in this Catalogue are from Rupanurag series, the first performance of which will be held in Paris in 2014.

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Painting Rupanurag at home (2010) 4

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