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What could be the most touristy town of Shekhawati, Mandawa appears the most when googling Shekhawati, be it hotels to stay in or havelis to visit. But Mandawa wasn’t always like this; in fact it once used to be a nondescript village until it came under the rule of Nawal Singh. He laid the foundation of Mandawa as we see it today and invited rich merchants to settle in Mandawa. Some of the prominent trader families in Mandawa were the Dhandhanias, Harlalkas, Ladias, Chokhanis, Sonthalias, Sarafs and the Goenkas. In those days, Mandawa was the heart of trade in the region.

The grace is in colors used for the murals. Before the 19th century only natural colors like the lampblack and red and green and yellow ochers were used. Limes, indigo, vermillion, cow urine collected from cows fed on mango leaves was used for yellow, flowers and even silver and gold was used for colors. Around 1850s German colors hit the market and became popular with the artists and by the start of 1900s the English chemical colors had flooded the market.

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What is special about murals of Mandawa?

Shekhawati abounds in the finest painted traditions. The rich Marwari families brought some of the finest European and Indian artists together to bring alive their walls. These walls were enlivened with artistic retellings of Indian epics and fables: murals of locomotives to depict a rail journey for citizens, Europeans in a horse carriage or taking off in a hot air balloon, trade treaties between Indian rulers and French and British merchants, playful depictions of Radha and Krishna, Rajasthani love story of Dhola-Maru and even scenes from Kamasutra.

In these havelis, through baithaks or sitting rooms, ornate silver hookahs, Belgian glass chandeliers, stinted glasses imbued with folksy perspectives and tales, arched gateways, courtyards and durbars; fresco art was celebrated and thrived with family’s growing wealth and prosperity. And this didn’t end at frescos and havelis, the region saw development of many structures from architecturally well laid schools to stepwells to ornate temples, standing as remnants of the artistic order that once prevailed here.

 

Frescos of mandawa

The havelis represent the triumph of the artist over the patron: They are three-dimensional canvases on which a rural imagination has left its imprint.

The village of Mandawa was once the lifeline of the Shekhawati Silk Route and was beaming with trade opportunities. But with time as the importance of the Gujarat port decreased the merchants of Mandawa shifted base to cities like Bombay, Calcutta and Madras. In the 19th and 20th century, Britishers provided safe trading opportunities to anyone who were willing to relocate to these upcoming trade markets. The Marwaris of Mandawa with an acumen for business seized this opportunity and left for greener pastures. Over the next 200 years, as their wealth increased, the merchants of Mandawa started investing on their ancestral havelis with detailed frescoes. Most of them never returned, the opulent havelis were left at the hands of caretakers. Years of neglect has left the havelis in a dilapidated state.

Reminisce of a Bygone Era

The artistic representation of the frescoes shows communal harmony, technological progress, religious sentiments and the affects of acculturation. The paintings are not only of Hindu Gods and Goddesses but also of ordinary people. The painted Havelis of Mandawa also adorn the walls with delicate flower motifs, images of an English lifestyle and characters from Indian mythology.

In the desert, painted onto once-great — and now, mostly abandoned — houses, is dazzling proof of the Indian state’s opulent history.

The havelis are mostly empty now, and their desolation, combined with their scale and opulence, produces a feeling of wonder. The painter Francesco Clemente, who visited Shekhawati a couple of years ago, described the houses as being in “a fantastic state of disrepair.” He wondered if the havelis of Shekhawati had not always been “ornamental houses,” whose true purpose was to showcase the wealth and prestige of their owners. The thought is a nice one, because whatever the truth may have been, most of the houses are now empty; and, as such, they represent the triumph of the artist over the patron: They are once again 3D canvases on which a rural imagination has left its imprint. That imagination is not the work of a single individual, but rather one in which the genius of the collective has coalesced. That is why the houses capture the soul of the place. “Generations upon generations,” the Swiss artist Alice Boner once wrote of a pair of vessels that she felt embodied the spirit of Indian craftsmanship, “of artists and users must have pooled their experience to achieve objects of this kind. An analysis of the parts which compose them does not solve the mystery of their being.”

Uniqueness 

The strange cacophony in images in havelis of Mandawa symbolizes the changing times. As owners travelled across Europe, they brought with them new ideas of gondolas, airplanes and cars, which were faithfully translated on walls by the side of traditional familiar images of gods and goddesses. And then there are images of bowler-hatted Englishmen and queens and princess in horse carriages or typical English villages.

These walls were enlivened with artistic retellings of Indian epics and fables: murals of locomotives to depict a rail journey for citizens, Europeans in a horse carriage or taking off in a hot air balloon, trade treaties between Indian rulers and French and British merchants.

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