Paresh Rathwa

The Rathwa tribe is an Indo-Aryan speaking tribe of 550,000 inhabitants located mainly in Gujarat. The Rathwas have origins and traditions comparable to those of the Bhils; like them, they worship the god Pithora. The Bhils and Rathwas are animists. Pithora-style frescoes and paintings are rituals before they are works of art. They are made at the request of a family, on three of the interior walls of the house, to grant a wish or to thank the gods. The painter, called "lekhindra", acts as an intercessor with the divine. The essence of the Pithora ritual lies in the proximity to the earth. The themes bear witness to this, as do the materials: pigments, milk and flower liquor from Mahua (the sacred tree), layers of mud, dung and lime prepared by a young girl. The Pithoras frescoes, performed exclusively by men, represent the sun and the moon, animals and insects, the myth of creation and gods like Vat Deo, the god with twelve heads.