Earliest surviving Hindu painting from Badami restored

One of the earliest surviving paintings in a Hindu temple – from the world-famous Badami Cave Temples – has been photographed, digitally restored and formally unveiled to a global audience.

The Badami Cave Temples complex of Hindu and Jain cave temples located in Badami, a town in the Bagalkot district in northern Karnataka, is a UNESCO-designated World Heritage Site.

The 6th-century mural – ‘Queen and her Attendents’ – have been restored by eminent art-historian, photographer and filmmaker Binoy K Behl.

At an event titled ‘A Lost Tradition of Art’ & ‘Earliest Surviving Painting in Hindu Temple’, the painting was unveiled in presence of Dr Vinay Sahasrabuddhe, the President of Indian Council for Cultural Relations and Suresh Prabhu, India’s Sherpa to G7 and G20 last week.

The virtual event presented by Sapio Heritage Restoration Division, a division of government advisory firm Sapio Analytics.

“This is the earliest surviving painting in a Hindu Temple,” said Behl.

“Besides the great technical virtuosity of the ancient Indian murals, what is even more important is the vision of life which they contain. It is a deep and philosophic vision of great compassion. This is what makes the ancient paintings of India to be among the finest art of humankind,” said Behl about the significance of this revelation.

“The painting ‘Queen and her Attendants' dates back to the 6th century...it is established by dating…this makes it the oldest known mural,” Ashwin Srivastava, CEO of Sapio Analytics, told DH on Sunday.

It is from Cave No 3 of Badami Cave Temple complex and was photographed in 2001 and then digitally restored. “It was photographed through pioneering low-light photography techniques that have been innovated to capture the ancient culture of India,” he said.

“It’s time that cities should not be like melting pots but like salad bowls, maintaining their identities while co-existing. One can know who we are through ancient Indian art”, added Dr Sahasrabuddhe.

Srivastava and Balkrishna Choolun, Director of Ajanta HC in London, announced the preservation of the restored and unrestored photograph of Shri Behl at the Arctic World Archive, in Svalbard, Norway, and a series of global exhibitions in different cities of the world.

“For generations to come, we shall preserve this artform as a reminder to the power of Indian art in elevating human consciousness”, added Srivastava.