In the northern Sahyadri hills of Maharashtra, India, there is a tradition of painting among a tribal group called Warli. The Warlis now live in Thane district’s Dahanu, Talasari, Jawahar, Warda, Mokada, Vikramgarh, and Palghar Sadars in the mountainous region between Gujarat and Maharashtra.

They are a large group among the tribes of India. The Warlis speak their language, which has no written form. However, their language is considered to be a southern variety of the mainstream of Indo-European languages.

The name 'Warli' is derived from warla which means 'land or field'. This tribe led a life like other tribals by hunting and gathering fruits in the hill forests. Over time, such human groups usually settled in the plains at the foot of the mountains, hoping for more prey. Wild animals come to drink there, fish can also be hunted. Again, when agriculture is in vogue, it is logical to settle in plains. In the mountains, one could live in a cave, but in the plains, one had to build houses, the Warlis built mud houses, mud houses are quite comfortable in the climate of this region of India, warm in winter, cool in summer and less humid in monsoon.

Until the middle of the 19th century, the Warlis lived in the lush green forests of these hills, living a rural life with hill farming and animal husbandry. Land ownership documents were not required, since the beginning of British rule, and people from other communities started settling in the area. Completely ignorant of land ownership documents, these tribals gradually lost their agricultural land and became economically very weak. When they rebelled in 1946 after making various appeals to the government but to no avail, the generally forgotten Warlis quickly became known throughout India. As a result of the intensity of the movement, the government was forced to accept most of their demands. As a result, they can protect their permanent habitat. But the Warli painting that we see now, was introduced to educated urbanites in the 70s. Yashodhar Dalmiya in his book 'Painted World of Warli' mentions that when this folk culture came to be known in the seventies there was a lot of clamor for its unique features.

Warli art differs greatly from other folk painting traditions of India in terms of subject matter and painting style. Some historians date this painting to the 10th century AD, but its documentary basis is not very strong. Some have pointed to certain features of this painting as early as 2500 BC. Some motifs of Warli paintings are also found in prehistoric cave paintings of India (eg Bhimbetka Caves of Bhopal).

Image: Processional painting in the prehistoric Bhimbhetka Cave  

Warli pictures were painted on the walls of their mud houses. Mud houses used to be quadrangular, the practice of mud wall decoration is found in many other places in the subcontinent. In their case, the artists of this craft are the housewives. They used to fill the walls of their houses with these pictures during various family and social festivals. But these pictures are not the story of gods and goddesses, Warli paintings are based on lines, natural colors are mixed on dung-coated mud walls to create a background, and brushes are made by beating the head of a bamboo kanchi. And white color is mixed with rice powder. This time, Warli housewives will draw pictures on the wall with the assembly of white lines and dots with skillful hands. Traditionally their pictures had only one color, but now that rule is no longer followed. Some geometric shapes are used in different ways in the picture. These shapes derive from nature and way of life. For example, triangles come from mountains or hill trees, circles from the moon or sun, and squares from cultivated land. The basic concepts of drawing such as straight lines, curves, points, etc. are natural discoveries in people's daily life.

Image: Warli painting on the wall of a mud house

Various themes are represented in Warli paintings with various combinations of geometric shapes. For example, to draw a man, two triangles and the number of lines for the arms and legs are used, or to draw a horse, the body is drawn across the two triangles, along with the number of lines for the legs. Through repeated use of these figures, a geometric shape or pattern is formed. The pictures shown here are proof of that.

Unlike wall painting or vertical drawing techniques, these images are large, without skill, the image can be damaged. Rather, if mistaken, the surface should be dug up and again covered with dung soil, dried, and then painted again. If the painting is for a festival, they won’t get a long time. So, training and experience is essential. The Warli tribe is not a follower of a formal religion like Hinduism, but non-religious either, they are nature worshippers, so their life is based on various rituals like changing seasons, harvest, or any of their traditional fairs. The subjects of their pictures are also about them, boys and girls dancing around their special type of flute player, animals grazing in the field, and everyone working in the harvest field etc. The miseries of their lives, the hundred years of tyrannical oppression on them, do not seem to have been painted much.

There are several steps to drawing Warli paintings, followed in sequence;

1. First you have to make a plan and a drawing of the whole picture.

2. Wall, cloth, paper, that is, where the picture will be, the planned drawing is drawn again.

3. Drawing tools were kept close at hand, and bamboo kanchi heads were used to make brushes for wall painting but now regular brushes available in the market are used.

4. This drawing is usually done with white paint.

5. Human figures are drawn first before drawing other subjects.

6. According to the first drawing, various natural elements such as plants, animals, birds, flowers, and leaves are depicted in the picture.

It would not be wrong to call the Warli paintings as story paintings, through these paintings they depict their current lifestyle, and education for the next generation. Painting with the urge to tell them the stories passed down from generation to generation. As the Warli language has no written form, pictures speak. There are no special people in their linear picture, but there are events. Again, daily life is expressed in traditional stories, such as farming in the fields, or living with nature, not spoiling it, and non-specific things like that. In traditional European painting, there was a dramatization of an event, in the Warli painting the artist creates various compositions, and brings together various subjects but is not seen as a narrative of a single event.

Warli is a flat drawing, with no attempt at three-dimensionality, perspective, or front-and-back. A variety of geometric shapes are created through the assemblage of line figures and other shapes, and small shapes are attached, at which time the artist easily draws the three-dimensional content on a plane in such a way that the question does not arise a person standing or lying down, but may appear many people are holding hands and dancing. Storytelling in pictures is to be understood here. There are farmers but not specific farmers, cows are not specific cows, they are characters in the story, general pictures of life passing through time. Teaching the next generation that - we live together, we dance together, we have our musical instruments, we love nature.

Similar to the Zulu indigenous peoples of Africa, the Warli paintings are also non-realistic, with the difference in drawing being that the Zulu paintings are colorful, but the Warli paintings are monochromatic.

There is an expression of simplicity in the flattening of three-dimensional reality, but also an attempt to tap into the increasingly formless. When time has passed, an impersonal side of the story of the current time comes, to retain the mood (tone) even though so much time has passed, perhaps unknowingly, this tribal group has preserved the custom of painting such pictures.

Image: African Zulu Art

This painting developed as a companion to Shruti, tells the story of life, and tells the story of festivals, so when mud houses were replaced by paved houses, the materials changed. New times brought new methods, but the story remains the same. There were white line drawings on clay walls, now on cloth, colored lines on white paper, and new designs of black lines.

Image: Warli painting mural in Durham, North Carolina

Image: Various current events are depicted in mural art

This expression of Warli paintings started to be appreciated in Indian art circles in the seventies. The basic shapes of these paintings are most imitated in the design world. There are new designs in Warli motifs on cloth, paper, leather, and board. A single colored drawing on the earthen wall now leaves the wall and comes up on the edge of the saree. Indian artisans are spreading Warli prints on leather bags all over the world. It is now questionable how much the Warlis can be involved with this design. However, due to the worldwide demand for their art, the life of the Warlis has changed, some of them are now rich and are being awarded with various honors.

Some of the famous artists are as follows,

1. Sri Jivya Soma Masey, Dahanu, Maharashtra, Padma Bhushan Award, India-2011 AD.

2. Dinesh Bhohir, Supande, Vada, Maharashtra, India.

3. Ganes Mahadev Bhangad, Ganjad, Dahanu, Maharashtra, India.