Legacy of art in India

Art and aesthetics is not something used just for pleasure and entertainment; it is indulged in the daily lifestyle, social structure and daily utilities. It was rumoured and propagated with planning for so many years that Aryans were more sophisticated and more developed than ancient Indians, and the concept of civilisation was introduced to India by the Aryans. At the same time, it was discovered afterwards that the earliest civilisations of the world were found in the Indus Valley. Not just that, even in the southern and eastern part of India, the tribal communities also have a long history of their civilisations and arts and culture associated with it. Although, the establishment is reluctant to term these tribal cultures as civilisations. But, here we'll see how civilised they were and why they can also be identified as civilised ones.

Art of Indus-Valley Civilization

It was started from a very basic village form during 7000 BC, and it took almost 4000 years to get civilised properly. But, throughout this slow growth, the urge for newness and the development of lifestyle, people began transforming natural raw materials to their desired size and shape for use. The sense of art and aesthetics can be found in the archaeological evidence of that period. During 3000 BC, when urbanisation began, there came an entire change along with the development of lifestyle and techniques. They discovered the technique of making burnt bricks with soil, built houses and walls of bricks, and made permanent cities. Even they used to make pillars with designer textures. The permanent cities had proper drainage systems and proper places for waste materials. There were water storage systems, proper bathing systems, and thick walls surrounding the cities after 2600 BC. People of the Indus-Valley civilisation were so much developed in the case of aesthetics that they used to make clothes, designer walls, paintings on the walls and their daily utensils, and even the people used to make jewellery for their ornamentation. They used to use stamps with animal symbols and even began writing scriptures.

Art and aesthetics of Tribal India

There have been so many tribes living in India since the ancestral period, long before the Aryans came here. There were so many tribes living throughout the Indian subcontinent. There were the Bhils, Gonds, Kols, Mundas, Santhals, and so many other tribes who have their history of living in the hills and jungles, along with subsistence to nature. They used to make caves, small huts with trees. They used to produce colours from flowers, leaves and fruits and do paintings on their habitats. Later, they used to make pots and jewellery with soil. Different tribal communities had different art forms and varieties of creation for their daily needs. The tradition is in continuity to date, but now, the tribes and their cultures are under threat of extinction.