The Living Legacy of Tharu Printmaking
Printmaking, known as Chappai Kala in the southern plains of Nepal, has been a cherished tradition among the Tharu community for generations. This art form is not confined to galleries or museums but thrives in the rhythms of daily life, embedded in rituals, festivals, and domestic routines. From doorways and kitchen storerooms to the pressed ridges of thekua—a deep-fried sweet snack made from wheat flour—Tharu printmaking tells stories that have been passed down through time.
Manu Kumar Chaudhary, a young visual artist and recent graduate from Kathmandu University, has studied this unique form of expression. His thesis on Tharu printmaking highlights how it is deeply rooted in the community’s cultural practices. “When I started studying printmaking, I realized we already had it in our culture: woodblock impressions, thumb prints, palm printing. It wasn’t new to us; it was just unnamed,” he reflects. Unlike the techniques popularized in Europe or Japan, Tharu printmaking is not limited to paper or studios. Instead, it emerges during rituals like thapa marne, where handprint impressions are made during Tihar, and in the crafting of food offerings such as thekua, shaped using carved wooden moulds called agrautai.
These prints are more than aesthetic choices; they are expressions of lineage and locality. In the Tharu calendar, printmaking appears seasonally, much like the crops their lives depend on. During Chhath, women press the rich brown dough of thekua into intricately carved wooden blocks. These blocks carry designs inspired by local flora and fauna, such as the curve of a fish, the bloom of a hibiscus, or the sun’s circle. The thekua moulds are typically made from durable woods like sakhua or sissoo, which resist rain and hold their carvings well.
During Tihar, another ritual unfolds. On Sohraiya, the day following Gobardhan Puja, Tharu families clean their farming tools, wash their oxen, and oil the wooden doors of their homes. Then they begin to print. A mixture of rice flour and water is prepared to create a paste, and palms are dipped into this slurry and pressed onto walls, gates, and tools, creating thapa, the handprints of the Tharu. “Seven handprints are made on a wall to symbolise the goddess Laxmi,” explains Manu. “We place a red tika at the centre of the palm print. It’s our way of honouring the tools and animals that help us live.”
Sanjib Chaudhary, a cultural researcher, notes that these print practices are deeply embedded in the everyday. “You’ll see these prints on grain storage containers, on the bodies of animals, on the walls of homes,” he says. “They’re made with what’s at hand—carved into bottle gourds, or applied with fingers. The aesthetic is flat, linear, and always local.” In eastern Tharu regions, coconut trees and peacocks are common motifs, while in the west, monkeys and karam trees appear in carvings. Despite regional variations, the art shares a visual grammar: repetition, symmetry, and connection to land.
In some households, old treasure boxes carry faded impressions of earlier prints. In others, the wooden blocks that shape food are passed down like heirlooms. Elder community members recall pressing dough into these carved moulds since childhood. Nagjyoti Devi Tharuni from Parsa district recalls, “I don’t remember when we started. It has always been there. The blocks carry the hands of our mothers and grandmothers.”
For Gujeswori Devi Tharuni, now in her eighties, the carving of blocks was a craft of necessity and skill. “The woods we used: sal, sakhuwa, karam—were strong. The designs came from our surroundings. What we saw, we carved. We used to make these ourselves or buy them in the market if we couldn’t,” she shares.
The visual language—fish, flowers, peacocks, suns, the five-petal Asian abutilon flower—is rooted in the Tharu’s interaction with nature and agriculture. “The abutilon is a five-petal shape that can be made using two fingers in sequence, and it is the most common design. Even without formal tools, Tharu artists developed forms that were efficient, beautiful, and symbolic.”
There’s also a tactile intimacy to the process. In some villages, children cut the tops off bottle gourds, carve patterns into the pulp, dip them in natural dyes, and print them on cattle hides. The action is playful, but the meaning is not frivolous. “It’s about connection,” says Manu. “Between people, humans and animals, us and the land.”
Art educator and textile designer Prabha Napit reflects on these traditions with quiet caution. “Mass imports from India have eclipsed traditional block printing in Nepal,” she says. “When everything is available cheaper, faster, cleaner, people forget the value of what takes time.” Napit, who teaches at Kathmandu University, grew up in a neighborhood where woodblock carving was once a primary trade. “I’ve seen blocks from the 1980s in my home,” she says. “Today’s blocks are lighter, cheaper. The older ones were heavier, red-brown in color, with fine detail. You can’t find that quality now.”
She believes one reason for the decline in traditional printmaking is the reluctance to share. “Older generations kept the craft close. They feared losing their market. And so the knowledge died with them.”
Despite this fading, Manu sees potential in bridging traditional and contemporary practices. “In the city, we work on etching and zinc plates. In the village, it’s woodblocks and slurry paste. But the content—the stories, the motifs—remains the same,” he says. Sanjib echoes the sentiment. “These traditions will change. That’s natural. But understanding their roots allows us to grow in meaningful directions.”
For Napit, revival doesn’t mean romanticising the past. “You don’t need to preserve every technique,” she says. “But you do need to understand it. That’s how you create responsibly.”
As more artists like Manu integrate Tharu printmaking into their formal work, the line between ritual and art becomes thinner. In his recent projects, he has experimented with adapting thekua blocks into contemporary prints and using natural dyes in city-based studios. “I want our people to see these as art forms, not just customs,” he says. “When you respect your culture, you protect your identity.”
Traditional printmaking in the Tharu community is not a static practice etched in museum glass. Instead, it is a living form that flickers in kitchen corners during Chhath, glows on mud walls during Tihar, and imprints itself on the hearts of those who practice it. Whether in a palm print on a plough, a pressed thekua shared in prayer, or a woodblock carved in memory of a flower, these impressions are part of a lineage. They ask not to be glorified, but simply acknowledged.
As Manu puts it, “This isn’t just about saving a tradition. It’s about remembering where we come from. And pressing that memory, repeatedly, into the surface of daily life.”
