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Mysore painting () is an important form of classical painting style that originated in and around the town of Mysore in Karnataka. The painting style was encouraged and nurtured by the Mysore Kingdom rulers. Painting in Karnataka has a long and illustrious history, tracing its origins back to the Ajanta Caves period (2nd century BC to 6th century AD). The distinct school of Mysore painting evolved from the paintings during the Vijayanagara Empire period, the rulers of Vijayanagara and their feudatories encouraged literature, art and architecture as well as religious and philosophical discussions. With the fall of the Vijayanagara Empire after the 1565 Battle of Talikota, the artists who were until then under royal patronage migrated to various places such as Mysore, Tanjore and Surpur among others. Absorbing the local artistic traditions and customs, the erstwhile Vijayanagara school of painting gradually evolved into the many styles of painting in South India, including the Mysore and Tanjore painting.
Mysore paintings are known for their elegance, muted colours, and attention to detail. The themes for most of these paintings are Hindu gods and goddesses and scenes from Hindu mythology.
The successors of Raja Wodeyar continued to patronize the art of painting by commissioning temples and palaces to be painted with mythological scenes. However, none of these paintings have survived due to the ravages of war between the British on the one side and Hyder Ali and Tippu Sultan on the other. Hyder and Tippu who bested the Wodeyars took over the reins of Mysore for a brief period. However, the artists (Chitragars) continued to be patronised and flourished under the reign of Tipu and Hyder too. The Narasimha swamy temple in Seebi on the highway between Tumkur and Sira was built by Nallappa who was in the service of both Haidar Ali and Tipu Sultan, during Tipu's reign and has several wonderful wall frescoes in the Vijayanagar style which gradually evolved into the Mysore and Tanjore schools of painting. The murals detailing the Battle of Polilur and other painted work at the Daria Daulat Bagh palace of Tipu Sultan in Ganjam, Srirangapatna are also prime examples of the Mysore school of painting.
After the death of Tipu Sultan in 1799 AD, the state was restored back to the Wodeyars of Mysore and its ruler Mummadi Krishnaraja Wodeyar III (1799-1868 AD) who was contemporaneous with Serfoji II of Thanjavur. This ushered in a new era by reviving the ancient traditions of Mysore and extending patronage to music, sculpture, painting, dancing and literature. Most of the traditional paintings of the Mysore School, which have survived until today, belong to this reign. Furthermore, Krishnaraja Wodeyar provided new fillip to the artists of the Mysore school through his Magnum Opus Sritattvanidhi, which would remain the ready reckoner on Mysore style for many years to come. On the walls of Jagan Mohan Palace, Mysore (Karnataka), the fascinating range of paintings which flourished under Krishnaraja Wodeyar can be seen: from portraits of the Mysore rulers, their family members and important personages in Indian history, through self-portraits of the artists themselves which Krishnaraja Wodeyar coaxed them to paint, to murals depicting the Hindu pantheon and Puranic and mythological scenes.
Other Sanskrit literary sources such as the Visnudharmottara Purana, Abhilasitarthacintamani and Sivatatvaratnakara also throw light on the objectives and principles of painting, methods of preparing pigments, brushes and the carrier, qualifications of the chitrakar (traditional community of painters) the principles of painting and the technique to be followed.
The first stage of Mysore Painting was to prepare the ground; paper, wood, cloth or wall grounds were variously used. The paper board was made of paper pulp or waste paper, which was dried in the sun and then rubbed smooth with a polished quartz pebble. If the ground was cloth it was pasted on a wooden board using a paste composed of dry white lead (safeda) mixed with gum and a small quantity of gruel (ganji). The board was then dried and burnished. Wood surfaces were prepared by applying dry white lead, yellow ochre and gum, and walls were treated with yellow ochre, chalk and gum. After preparation of the ground a rough sketch of the picture was drawn with crayon prepared from the straight twigs of the tamarind tree. The next step was to paint the furthest objects such as sky, hill and river and then gradually animal and human figures were approached in greater detail. After colouring the figures, the artists would turn to elaboration of the faces, dress and ornaments including the gesso work (gold covering), which is an important feature of Mysore painting.
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