LB 51

Ladoo Bai is a Bhil artist born in the village of Jhabua in Madhya Pradesh. She used to make art on the walls of her house for recreational purposes way before she decided to pursue it as a profession. Her art was discovered in the 1970s by Jagdish Swaminathan, the then director of Bharat Bhavan. She was among the manual labourers employed for the construction of a new museum in Bhopal. The most common theme of Bhil painting is the Pithora horse, which is considered an offering to the Goddesses. The painters are known as lekhindra in the common language of the community. One can even see in their paintings the change of season, which is the natural phenomenon to harvest and it also, depicts the gods who protects them.