Mural painting refers to the painting done directly on the walls. Indian Mural Paintings are generally the paintings that are made on the walls of caves and palaces.
The earliest evidence of the murals is the beautiful frescoes painted on the caves of Ajanta and Ellora, the Bagh caves and Sittanvasal cave.
In the old scripts and literature, there was much evidence of mural paintings.
According to Vinaya Pitaka, the noted courtesan of Vaishali – Amrapali employed painters to paint the kings, traders and merchants of that time on the walls of her palace.
Freshco mural paintings: Technique and features
Vishnudharmottara, a Sanskrit text of the 5th/6th century CE gives a detailed description about Indian wall painting techniques and processes.
Features:-
- The process of these paintings appears to have been the same in all the early examples that have survived with an only exception in the Rajarajeshwara temple at Tanjore which is supposed to be done in a true fresco method over the surface of the rock.
- Most of the colours were locally available.
- Brushes were made up from the hair of animals, such as goats, camels, mongooses, etc.
- Naturally obtained colours were widely used. These principal colours widely used were red(obtained usually from animal blood), ochre, vivid red (vermilion), yellow ochre, indigo blue, lapis lazuli, lamp black (Kajjal), chalk white, terraverte and green.
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Methods of mural paintings
- Freshco Mural- In the very first step, a mixture of cow dung clay and rice husk is applied on the wall of the cave. Then it is coated with lime plaster. In the final step an image is created and colours are applied. The initial mixture absorbs the colour and it gets imprinted on the wall of the cave.
- The ground was coated with an exceedingly thin layer of lime plaster over which paintings were drawn in water colours.
- In the true fresco method, the paintings are done when the surface wall is still wet, so that the pigments go deep inside the wall surface.
Major themes of Mural paintings
Major themes of Mural paintings include spiritualist ideas and teachings of Jainism, Buddhism, Vaishnavism, Shaivism, Hinduism along with secular aspects of life. Some of the paintings also depict royal figures and dynastic heroics or achievements.
Earliest and surviving mural paintings at different locations
| Name of caves/ Painting | Area | Royal patronage | Theme of the paintings | Special facts |
| Ajanta cave | Aurangabad district of Maharashtra | No royal patronage but developed mainly by Satavahana dynasty and the Vakataka dynasty | These paintings depict scenes from the life of the Buddha, as well as from Hindu mythology and the lives of everyday people. | |
| Ellora cave | Aurangabad district of Maharashtra | Vishnu Tradition | Surviving mostly in Kailashnath Temple | |
| Bagh cave | Madhya Pradesh | Buddhism was a major theme. These paintings are materialistic rather than spiritualistic. | ||
| Badami cave | Karnataka | Chalukyan patronage especially under Manglesh Chalukya | Vaishnavism | |
| Sittanavasal | Tamil Nadu | Pandyas | Jainism | |
| Chola mural | Tanjore | Mainline Chola | Based on royal figures and Shaivite tradition | |
| Vijaynagar mural | Andhra | Patronised by Krishnadeva raya | Based on secular aspects of life | |
| Nayak Mural | Tamil Nadu | Nayak rulers of Madurai | Theme mainly based on Hinduism along with paintings depicting life of Vardhaman Mahavira | |
| Kerala Murals | kerala | Rulers of Travancore | Ramayana, Mahabharata and Puranas | In the late medieval period paintings related to Judaism and Christianity were also seen. |
Along with cave paintings other notable features of ancient and medieval art includes temple architecture, stupa structures, pillars, inscriptions and coinage.
Practice Questions
- There are only two known examples of cave paintings of the Gupta period in ancient India. One of these is paintings of Ajanta caves. Where is the other surviving example of Gupta paintings? (UPSC 2010)(a) Bagh caves
(b) Ellora caves
(c) Lomas Rishi cave
(d) Nasik cavesAnswer- (b)
