Songlines FEATURED EVENTS

Scroll paintings have long served as moving storyboards, carrying narratives of community life, environment, labour, and belief through image, rhythm, and repetition. In the Deccan region, these traditions evolved as visual storytelling practices where colour, motif, and sequence worked together to transmit knowledge across generations. Drawing connections to Songlines: Tracking the Seven Sisters, the workshop explores how stories travel across land, memory, and shared cultural systems.

Led by Cheriyal folk artist and cultural educator Diana, the session introduces participants to the visual language and materials of Deccani scroll traditions, including the use of natural colours and symbolic motifs rooted in everyday life and community narratives.

Participants will begin with an illustrated introduction to the history and techniques of scroll painting, followed by a hands-on making session. Working with natural clay and stone pigments, gum arabic, and fine brushes, they will create their own painted scroll segments on canvas while learning how borders, figures, and landscapes come together to form sequential storytelling compositions.

Designed for participants interested in traditional art practices and material-led learning, the workshop encourages slow, mindful engagement with craft while offering insight into how heritage art forms continue to resonate in contemporary contexts.

About the Artist:
Diana, from Andhra Pradesh, is an educator, writer, art therapist, and Cheriyal folk artist with over 24 years of experience. A dedicated advocate of Cheriyal art—a traditional art form from Telangana—she conducts workshops to promote and preserve this fading heritage. She has been honoured by the Ministry of Culture, Government of India, and her work has been exhibited nationally and internationally, including at Jehangir Art Gallery, Mumbai.

While you are here, explore the ongoing exhibition
SONGLINES: Tracking the Seven Sisters