Forest Fire

During the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries the influence of oil painting and the increased demand for naturalism in painting forced a large number of anonymous bazaar painters to adapt inherited formats of religious and mythological pictures to suit new visual tastes. It appears that the artist of the current work has been influenced by European natural history prints that were popular in Calcutta at the turn of the last century. It is interesting to note that it is the animals and not the deities that take center stage in the image. The recessed landscape, the blurring of objects in the distance and the attention given to the three-dimensional modeling of animals exhibit the artist's strong grasp of perspective and naturalism. The use of bright and well-blended colors imbue the canvas with a sense of fluidity and movement that stands in contrast to the rigidity and stiffness that is characteristic of some earlier schools of miniature painting.
This work probably represents a scene from the Avanya Kand chapter of the Mahabharata. In the ongoing battle between the Kauravas and the Pandavas, the Pandavas demand a piece of territory that the Kauravas refuse to release. Instead, the Kauravas offer the Pandavas another piece of land where they promise to build a magnificent palace. Seizing the opportunity to try and destroy their enemy, the Kauravas build the palace out of wax. The Pandavas sensing treachery, decide to build a tunnel running under the palace as a means of escape.
The present scene shows the destruction and chaos that reigns when the Kauravas set the palace on fire. The fire spreads quickly and devastatingly through the surrounding forest, and here the innocent animals are seen fleeing for their lives away from the fire.
The Pandavas manage to escape through their underground tunnel.