Of prints, whimsical and individualistic

ARTWALK

Let me begin with a cliched question: what is common to Raja Ravi Varma and a baroque town nestled in the mountains in Brazil? Whether or not you can guess the answer, rest assured: the cliches end at the question.

Ouro Preto, in the Brazilian state of Minas Gerais, is the unlikeliest place for anyone to ever recall Ravi Varma. Its undulating streets and precious 18th century churches, now museums, all accentuate the near-complete conquest of this giant territory by the Portuguese, who greeted their discovery by blessing it with the sign of the cross.

But in the Museum Oratorio, or the Museum of Oratories here, the lower floor displays coax you to think harder about what you are seeing. An oratory is a bit of a cross between a puja-ghar and taveej.

It could be a large, heavy, ornate object or a small travel oratory to keep around your neck. Whatever its shape, it was meant to offer the Catholic a mini-chapel to house saints and Christ, while being blessed overwhelmingly, 24x7. Amidst all this, popular oratories have you catching your breath for what they reveal.

Imagine a wooden recess with flap-doors that open out when it's time to pray. On the sides are images of saints you may not even recognise. Inside, a mini-mandir has been formed around a central figure. Flowers, cloth, more statuettes "" all clutter adoringly around a central figurine.

Small images of various saints, stuck around the frames and peripheries, were critical to many oratories. Prints then were often black and white, simple and repetitive, as prints are intended to be.

But over them, individuals painted, decorated and re-designed the image. Each saint, each face, was re-fashioned by the imagination of the individual. These oratories were decorated painstakingly by their owners, in whimsical, individualistic style. The popular aesthetic is thus tantalisingly present in these sacred objects.

This is not very different from the many highly decorated Raja Ravi Varma prints, decorated in Burma, that Delhi has been lucky enough to see last month.

During that visual feast, viewers saw near-identical prints of Laxmis and Saraswatis, distinguishable only by their differently bejewelled bodies and perfectly draped sarees and frames.

If, in India, lace and sequins lovingly adorned the portraits, in Brazil the prints are treated no differently. There are beads, decoration and painting, all piled upon the smallest pieces.

In some cases, even empty matchboxes serve as shells for oratories. Both styles remained honoured in homes, in private spaces till they were available for public display. One as a framed print, and the other as a print stuck inside a larger tableau.

Religious institutions all over the world have historically been the centres of power struggle. Part of the strategy is to strictly control congregations of worshippers. But history, and also these prints, tell us how this has been subverted time and again.

In Ouro Preto, you needed the Church's permission to build even a small chapel for private purposes, despite the fact that it's residents included the rich, reapers of one of the biggest gold rushes at the time.

It wasn't easy to get permission and warranted harassment. Prints offered a way out. In India, their role ensured that everyone could now have a popular rendering, the dominant one of a deity through calendars, posters and other means.

Either way, the stories tell us how prints and their dissemination changed the home-altar and its possibilities. And that's the point. In two diverse continents, prints opened up channels for the individual to blossom forth as both artist and worshipper.