Friday, February 8, 2013

"Radha-Krishna" Madhubani Painting Step-by-Step

One of the most popular themes in Madhubani painting is that of Radha-Krishna. Krishna is the best known for his blue complexion. Blue skin in Indian art means dark complexion in the real life however, for some reason, blue is preferred.

Radha is always depicted as Krishna's lover, second-half, best friend or the chosen one out of gopis. Gopis were either "real" or mythical beings that were especially devoted to Krishna and used to play with him. Krishna's favorite gopi was Radha.

In this painting I tried to depict Radha and Krishna during one of those "plays", sitting on a high tree in a jungle, surrounded by flowers and plants. Krishna plays his bansuri (flute) and Radha holds a flower. As they are the higher beings, Krishna and Radha are "connected" with the cosmos with the colorful pipes. They would be normally invisible but here they symbolize their divine origin and task.

We will make this picture:

COPYRIGHT NOTE: you can copy and use it but not sell!





1. Make a border. It can be single, double or triple.



2. Start drawing your main object.



3. Add details under and above the object, build more details on the sides and top.



4. Start filling the shapes with designs and its up to you how much "empty space" you'd like to leave.



5. I prefer it to be completely filled with leaves and flowers, so my goal usually is to fill it to the maximum.



6. Color time! Try to look at the empty paper and feel which color you'd like a certain object to be. One tip: sometimes less colors can lead to a better and neater yet more powerful effect.



3 comments:

Unknown said...

Jai jai shree Radhey http://aartisharma.in

Aplihs said...

I got a square frame ( at my place its cheaper to buy frame rather than framing art) and copied.... was not sure how it would come out .it looks great. Thanks girl, the step by step really helped me. Please add more step by step illustrations

Vasudha Somayaji said...

Wow, thanks for the step by step procedure...

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