Basohli Painting
Beetle-wing green and hot orange — the bold first voice of Pahari painting.
Basohli painting is the earliest and most distinctive of the Pahari (hill) miniature styles, made from the late seventeenth century in the small Dogra kingdom of Basohli, now in Jammu's Kathua district. It is marked by intense flat colour — saffron, hot pink, emerald green, deep blue — large lotus-petal eyes, strong architectural framing, stylised trees, and, most famously, tiny fragments of iridescent beetle-wing case set into the painting to represent emeralds and other jewels. Favourite subjects are the Rasamanjari love poem, the Gita Govinda, ragamala sets and court portraits.
Craft at a Glance
Origin
Basohli, Jammu and Kashmir
Also Known As
Basohli qalam, early Pahari painting, Vishnupada style (of the Rasamanjari)
Craft Type
Miniature painting (Pahari school)
Practising Community
Court-attached painter families (many of Tarkhan and Brahmin origin); a few contemporary artists in the Jammu region continue the idiom
Materials
Wasli (layered handmade paper); mineral pigments such as malachite, orpiment, cinnabar and lapis, plus lac, indigo and gamboge; gum arabic binder; shell gold and silver; and the wing cases of jewel beetles for jewel highlights.
Known For
Vivid, stylised early Pahari miniatures with beetle-wing case highlights for jewels
Where It's Made
Basohli in Kathua district, Jammu; the style spread to Nurpur, Mankot, Kulu, Chamba and other hill courts
Time to Create
Days to several weeks per painting
GI Status
Basohli Painting is a registered GI of Jammu and Kashmir
Process Steps
Preparing the wasli
Several sheets of handmade paper are pasted together, dried and burnished smooth and hard with an agate stone.
Underdrawing
The composition is laid out in a light red-earth or charcoal line, then refined and fixed.
Priming with white
A thin coat of white ground is brushed over the drawing so the colours above it stay bright and even.
Laying flat colour
Large areas — sky, ground, architecture, garments — are filled with flat opaque mineral colour, background first.
Modelling and detailing
Faces, hands, foliage and textiles are shaded with fine hatching and wash and outlined with a very fine brush.
Applying gold and jewels
Ornaments are raised in thick white, gilded with shell gold, and set with cut fragments of beetle-wing case.
Ruling and painting the borders
The border is ruled and painted, often in a deep red, completing the page.
Final burnishing
The finished painting is laid face down on a smooth surface and burnished from the back to set and polish the pigments.
Technique Glossary
Pahari painting
The miniature traditions of the Himalayan foothill kingdoms of the Punjab and Jammu hills, of which Basohli is the earliest.
Rasamanjari
A Sanskrit poem classifying types of lovers, illustrated in a landmark Basohli series.
Wasli
Handmade paper built from several pasted sheets and burnished hard for painting.
Beetle-wing case
The iridescent green forewing of a jewel beetle, cut and applied to represent emeralds and enamel.
Shell gold
Powdered gold bound in gum, painted on and then burnished to a metallic shine.
Siyahi qalam
The fine brush, of a few squirrel or kitten hairs, used for outlining and detail.
Ragamala
A set of paintings personifying the musical modes, a common early Pahari subject.
Gita Govinda
Jayadeva's devotional poem on Radha and Krishna, frequently illustrated in the hill schools.
A Craft Through Time
Late 17th century
Kirpal Pal's court
The Basohli style emerges under Raja Kirpal Pal with a celebrated illustrated Rasamanjari series.
Early 18th century
Spread through the hills
Painters and the style move to Nurpur, Mankot, Kulu, Chamba and other Pahari states.
Mid-18th century
Eclipse by Kangra
The naturalistic Kangra manner supersedes the bold Basohli idiom at most courts.
Early 20th century
Rediscovery
Collectors and art historians re-establish Basohli as the vivid starting point of Pahari painting.
Late 20th century
Museum status
Major Basohli works enter museum collections in India and abroad and define the 'Basohli' label in art history.
Present
A revived idiom
A small number of artists in the Jammu region paint in the Basohli style, which now carries a GI tag.
Did You Know?
The emerald flecks that look like inset gems in Basohli paintings are real — thin pieces of the wing cases of jewel beetles, glued on and outlined so they catch the light like set stones.
Every craft has a story. Every story begins with tradition.