Turmeric for yellow, butterfly pea flowers (aparajita) for blue and cow dung for brown.

The natural colour palette of a patachitra artist made out of these ingredients caught the attention of a group of school students on a visit to Pingla in West Midnapore district recently.

Twenty students from La Martiniere for Boys spent two days at Pingla, interacting with the patachitra artists there.

Boys from Classes VIII to XII, some of who have opted for art as a subject in ISC, were part of this field trip which aimed to “engage them with the artists and their traditions.” “There are different kinds of folk art that exist around us that our boys and sometimes the adults are unaware of. We want to expose them to such art practices. They can learn about these art forms from the local artists,” said art teacher Romi Majumder, who accompanied the boys. Another art teacher, Dipendranath Pal, was also part of the group.

In Pingla, men and women make patachitra and earn a living. “They even make the colours, which is a long and tedious process. This was a revelation to our boys,” said Majumder.

The artists showed them how they cut a piece of cloth and put a piece of paper on it to make a scroll. The glue is a natural one prepared from the seeds of bel (wood apple), said Majumder.

Each scroll tells a story. Some of them depict the evils of child marriage or dowry.

“Some of the scrolls have a social message to convey. Even during the pandemic, the artists used patachitra as a medium to educate the villagers and beyond,” said Majumder.

Class XI boy Aryaman Kajaria was amazed to see how an entire village made a living out of an art form.

“It is fascinating. They have small kaccha houses but they are stacked with their artwork,” said Aryaman who has art as a subject.

“One of the artists, a woman, was such an expert that she was not even using a pencil to outline. She put colours on the scroll directly. Her fingers moved so deftly.”

Virajit Ghosh, a student of Class X, said that for the first time, he has painted with natural colours. “They make the colours from leaves, flowers and spices. The end product is just like the watercolours we use. We got to work with these natural colours,” he said.

The artists now are also diversifying where patachitra motifs are used to design kettles, mugs or other pieces of daily use.