Phad Painting

Folk Art of Rajasthan
Long ago, almost a 100 years ago, when there was no television and no movies, there were “Bhopas” in Rajasthan, who used to sing and recite the stories of the brave Rajput warriors while unscrolling the paintings, called PHAD paintings. Life history of great heroes like Prithviraj Chauhan, Goga Chauhan, Pabuji Rathore, Ramdevji, Tejaji and many more have been depicted in the Phad paintings. Even Amitabh Bachchan, the Big B has a phad painting created on his life history!

Traditionally this art was passed on from fathers to their songs. Phad painting was done on khadi cloth, which was as long as 30 feet and 5 feet wide, but now this is done mostly on paper. Colors used are vegetable dyes, and each color is used in a fixed order, one at a time. Yellow is used for ornaments, Orange for limbs and torso, Grey for structure, blue for water and curtains, green for trees and plants, and red for dress. Outlines are done with bold black lines.

The painting on the cover is of Pabuji’s marriage. After you have colored the sheets, draw a Phad painting of your Hero!

Original Painting by Parkash Joshi Instructions:

When using poster colors, first fill all the ornaments with yellow, then all the limbs and torso with orange, and then the dresses with red and green. Finally make the outlines with bold black paint. The painting can be framed or used as a bookmark later. To use natural color, follow the instructions in the sachet to make white and yellow colour and paint in the same order.

This Box Contains

6 poster colours
2 brushes
2 sachets of natural
Materials with recipe to make natural colour
10 colour cards Phad painting leaflet

A Creative Crafts Kit for Children of All Ages