Discover how Odisha State Award-winning artist Satyabhama Majhi captures the culture, spiritual beliefs, and forest life of the Dongaria Kondh tribe through her monumental Niyamgiri canvas artwork.
Soil and natural materials are not just tools for making art—they are active parts of the cultural memory being documented.
Satyabhama Majhi
Art has the extraordinary power to transcend mere visual representation and become a living record of culture, memory, and ecology. Leading this movement in contemporary Indian art is Satyabhama Majhi, a distinguished artist and Odisha State Award winner.
Through her latest exhibition, Land as Memory, Matter as Landscape, at artCENTRIX Space in New Delhi, Majhi brings her long-standing relationship with the Niyamgiri hills into a large visual chronicle. Her monumental canvas captures the daily existence, spiritual beliefs, and ecological harmony of the Dongaria Kondh, a Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Group (PVTG) in Odisha.
A Day of Community Life on a Single Canvas
Rather than presenting Niyamgiri merely as a mountain landscape, Majhi portrays it as a lived, sacred space. Her painting brings together intimate, everyday moments of the Dongaria Kondh community into a unified composition:
- Forest Foraging & Shared Labor: Women returning from the forest carrying baskets of produce and gathering beneath trees to sort mahua.
- Family & Communal Bonding: Scenes of a mother bathing her child beside a stream alongside community gatherings for music and storytelling.
- Un-Urbanized Coexistence: The complete absence of commercial activity or urban settings keeps the spotlight on the pure connection between people and nature.
Traditional Pigments and Tribal Wall-Art Techniques
Majhi’s work bridges ancient tribal art practices with contemporary fine art. Holding a Master of Fine Arts degree in Traditional Art, she incorporates dot work and repeated marks reminiscent of indigenous tribal wall paintings.
To make the painting an extension of the land itself, Majhi utilizes natural, earth-based pigments made from:
- Chalk Stone & Charcoal
- Turmeric & Geru Soil
- Brown Stone & Earth Shades
Deep blues represent the streams, while vibrant yellows dominate the sky, creating a raw, authentic visual identity rooted in the soil of Niyamgiri.
Preserving Culture Beyond Conflict
While the Niyamgiri region and its sacred deity, Niyam Raja, have long been at the heart of national discussions around mining and tribal rights, Majhi’s approach chooses a different path. Instead of focusing solely on political disputes, her artwork serves as a visual document of a way of life—preserving knowledge, rituals, and forest traditions across generations.
Majhi’s broader artistic philosophy explores concepts such as “Un-Urbanisation” and “Niyamgiri as Kin,” emphasizing that human identity and nature are inextricably linked.
An Esteemed Career in Public Art
Satyabhama Majhi’s contribution to preserving India’s artistic heritage extends across major national platforms:
- Odisha State Award (2012): Recognized for outstanding excellence in traditional and fine arts.
- New Parliament House Project (2023): Associated with the public art project People’s Wall – Jan, Janani, Janmabhumi under the Lalit Kala Akademi.
- Sasatwa Foundation: Serving as Secretary to promote cultural preservation and community art initiatives.