February

Sohni, the lovelorn, brave swimmer features in a few Pahari miniatures, several folk songs and plays. She was a real person who lived, breathed, loved, and died for love. Her grave in the Chenab is visited by many.

In the Punjab hills, Nainsukh painted her 200 years ago - that tiny miniature hangs in Banaras University Museum. The artist has deliberately used the same swimming posture, abstracting and contemporizing the figure. The love arrow dripping red hot blood is redemptive, unlike the cruel hunt in the landscape above derived from the Mewar (Rajasthan) miniatures that have similar landscapes with low hills and shrubs and leaping tigers.

The parrot with composite female figures has Cupid shooting the love arrow and this is a Rajasthani folk motif, quirky and intriguing. Passion flames in green, red and gold against the velvety black background, upon which Sohni swims, eternally alive in the Indian mind, like Juliet.