Four-armed goddess, with hearts in margin
1904
unspecified
From the collection of Cleveland Museum of Art
1904
unspecified
From the collection of Cleveland Museum of Art
Four-armed goddess, with hearts in margin is a 1904 unspecified by Unknown, held at Cleveland Museum of Art.
You see a four-armed goddess on paper, surrounded by little red hearts. She holds a lotus, a discus, and two other objects you can’t quite name. This painting comes from Mithila, a region in eastern India. Women there used to paint murals on walls for weddings and births. After a bad drought, they started making these on paper to sell and earn money. The hearts in the margin feel like a quiet, personal touch—almost like a signature. Look up more paintings from the Mithila region to see how these bright, bold lines tell whole stories.
This goddess holds a lotus flower and a discus, along with two other unidentified objects. Historically, Madhubani paintings were murals created with brushes made of bamboo and cotton. They ornamented domestic spaces on the occasion of a festival or rite of passage in a woman's life, such as a birth or a wedding. In the wake of a drought in 1966, the All India Handicrafts Board encouraged women of the Mithila region make paintings on paper, so they could sell them and help support their communities.
Village women of rural northeastern India create the distinctive paintings known as "Madhubani."
Read the full account in the museum source.
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