CASE STUDY ON

TRIBAL ART
MUSEUM
 INTRODUCTION
The Museum of Tribal Heritage at Bhopal was
commissioned by the Government of Madhya
Pradesh in 2004 since over 30% of the population
of the state is tribal. Its architecture was
The cultural by
informed diversity seen
their rich in Madhya
culture, Pradesh
evolved over is
hard to find anywhere else. Almost oblivious of
millennia.
political boundaries, communities living in states
peripheries, tribal communities continue
The architecture
linguistic, of theand
lifestyle, music museum, integrates
cultural exchanges.
seamlessly into a continuum, the outside with the
inside, the natural with the human construct, the
tribal with the urban and the viewer with the
viewed.
 SITE LOCATION
Madhya Pradesh Tribal Museum
LOCATION:-Shyamala Hills, Bhopal 462002, Madhya
LONGITUDE:-
Pradesh.
77 2305.16 E
LATITUDE23 1404.23 N
ALTITUDE
:- 1856 FT
:-
 DESIGN FEATURES
The architecture of the Museum is inspired by
tribal rhythms, geometries, materials, forms,
aesthetics and spatial consciousness, these very
qualities are now acting as points of inspiration
for the display materials being created by tribal
The structure is built of steel
artisans, supported tubes, castellated
by anthropologists,
girders, sociologists
and steel rods
andfabricated into intricate
social workers.
trusses. Steel seemed to be a natural choice in the
land & location of ancient Iron Age & Bronze Age
civilizations, and the contemporary truck body
building industry.
SIMILAR BUILDING NEAR
The State Museum
BY of Bhopal.
SIMILAR BUILDING NEAR
BY
The State Museum of Bhopal is amongst the best-
designed museums in India.
The museum has 16 different theme galleries,
showcasing the State's sculptural masterpieces, pre-
historic articles and fossils, excavated objects,
epigraphs, manuscripts, paintings, royal collection,
textile, documents, postal stamps, autographs,
miniature paintings, coins, arms and weapons, articles
associated with India's freedom struggle. The museum
also has reproductions of the now-destroyed Buddhist
Bagh Cave paintings, 84 rare Jaina bronzes of the 8th
to 11th centuries, Avalokesteshwaras of Lamaism,
Saivite sculptures and miniature paintings showing
the graceful lifestyles of those distant days.
 LAND MARK NEAR THE
EGIONAL COLLEDGE OF BHOPAL
SITE

RC BHARAT SCOUT AND GUIDE M.P.

 GALLERY 1
CULTURAL DIVERSITY
The task of establishing this specialty of Madhya
Pradesh and better understanding and display of its
multi-dimensional culture will be accomplished in
Gallery -1. The gallery will be arranged in manner
that will leave a deep impact on visitors about
Madhya Pradeshs multi-pronged cultural presence.
Like shoots of banyan tree spread far and wide and
are not confined to some definite limits, in the same
way culture of various tribes of Madhya Pradesh will
be put on display over there. Visitors will directly
observe here as to how cultural offshoots of a tribal
community crawl into other tribes beyond borders of
neighboring state. Pattern of the gallery will be briefly
as under:-
 GALLERY 1
CULTURAL DIVERSITY
1.A glimpse of Madhya Pradeshs map will be put up
in entire middle part of the gallery in such a way that
a visitor will have inkling about states geographical
contours, hills, plateaus, forest and serpentine path
of lifeline Narmada. Despite being map of Madhya
Pradesh, it will give visual effect of an uneven hillock.
 GALLERY 1
CULTURAL DIVERSITY
2. A banyan tree will be built amidst this map or
hillock. Offshoots of the banyan tree will be spread up
to sky (gallerys high ceiling) and surrounding states
tribal culture (whose glimpse will be shown on the
gallerys walls) whereas roots will be spread on the
gallerys floor. This vast tree will be made a via media
for various mediums so that there is no excessive
burden despite it being strong so that gigantic and
majestic look of the banyan tree (which is also state
tree and states emblem) is maintained.
 GALLERY 1
CULTURAL DIVERSITY
3.Geographical presence of all the major tribes living
in Madhya Pradesh will be symbolically shown on the
map drawn in the lower part of the gallery with the
help of their important symbols.
 GALLERY 1
CULTURAL DIVERSITY
4.Gallerys vastness and high ceiling motivates for
making innovations and there is scope for it also. A
staircase will rise from a place in the gallery and then
join ramps built above around entire gallery. Visitors
will climb up the ramps and have a birds eye view of
Madhya Pradeshs map. They will also feel
Down there atasthe
themselves places
a part adjoining
of this walls, there
vast cultural will
banyan
be various sculptures tree.
etc. showing tribal life and
culture of the state and bordering states, which will
help visitors analyze differences and similarities
between both the cultures.
 GALLERY 1
CULTURAL DIVERSITY
5.Flag-like maps will be hanged from branches of
banyan tree showing special features/similarities
between various tribal communities. These will be
displayed in the form of banners and scrolls.
 GALLERY 2
TRIBAL LIFE
A mammoth container for storing food grains has
been built in the gallery from where one enters
gallery -2 from gallery -1. This food grains container
is used in Gond tribal homes for creating a partition,
keeping food grains safe, as a canvas for wall paining
and keeping household things in cavities made on it
while the vacant space in between is used for moving
in and out.
 GALLERY 2
TRIBAL LIFE
1.Artists from Mandla have painted various images
on its walls with clay and colours , which also give an
insight on production of food grains and the methods
a Gond woman uses for keeping the grains safe.
Information about exhibits on various diverse aspects
of tribal culture shown in gallery -2 will be given with
the help of ultramodern mediums and equipments.
 GALLERY 2
TRIBAL LIFE
2.It explicit that neither can types of houses of all the
tribes of Madhya Pradesh be shown in the limited area of
gallery nor it is desirable in the context of this museum.
Here, only hints are being given about these houses
architectural, style-related, behavioral and material
features. Changes underwent by dwellings or homes of
these tribal communities are also being highlighted here.
For examples, walls of Baiga dwellings were earlier made
with some strong plant parts or grass. Later, they started
making walls by applying mud on bamboo grills and
finally walls were made of mud and then with bricks.
Earlier, leaves were used to make a thatch followed by
some specific types of grass and then with factory-made
English tiles. Analysis of this process of change will also
help understand changes witnessed in tribal areas.
 GALLERY 2
TRIBAL LIFE
3.In these dwellings, importance of open courtyard, trees
in the courtyard, presence of cattle in homes like family
members is also being displayed properly. Impression of
only outer portion of some houses will be made while
effort will be made to create geographical dimensions of
some houses. For example, dwellings of Bhil tribe are
lonely and on some small hillock and effort is being made
here to show a similar look. Paintings of important
household things are also being made. Specialties of
these simple dwellings and natural material used over
there like innumerable possibilities of wood and clay can
also being targeted here.
 GALLERY 2
TRIBAL LIFE
4.This gallery serves as a courtyard where dwellings
of various tribal communities are adjoining, peeping
into each other and creating each others
neighborhood. You will enter from the door of some
tribes dwelling and come out into some other tribes
house and sometimes into a lane of Baiga locality will
assure to take you to a lone hillock of some Bhil
dwelling.
 GALLERY 3
TRIBAL AESTHETIC
Tribal jewellery and other make-up paraphernalia will
be inlaid between two layers of glasses on the
windows of corridors from where one enters this
aesthetically decorated gallery. In a sense, it will be a
lattice made from jewelry and cosmetics. The gallery
will also have wooden or terracotta mannequins with
tattoo marks. The first canvas for expression of art is,
perhaps, the human body. Therefore, its use for
displaying various hues of adornments on human
body seems justified at the entry point of aesthetics.
 GALLERY 3
TRIBAL AESTHETIC
1.As pointed out earlier, there no such thing as art
separately in tribal life. But if look inversely, not even
simplest of things like broom or sil-batta (grinding
stone) are not untouched by aesthetics. Under these
circumstances, it is difficult to decide what to include
and what to leave. Therefore, we have set a target to
collect rituals of life cycle and songs of season cycle
in aesthetics gallery. There is a marriage canopy in
the midst of gallery, which will be under the shades
of four vast trees, each having identification emblem
of four different tribes. It will be more appropriate to
say that myths about origination of nature will bless
marriage, which is symbol of completeness and
continuity of life.
 GALLERY 3
TRIBAL AESTHETIC
2.Efforts are being made to provide opportunities to witness all the
hues and gallery from all angles from below or above in one way or
other. Two levels are being built in the marriage canopy being created
in the midst of the gallery so that visitor can see not only marriage
rituals and symbols ingrained on trees, but will also have an overall
minute view of entire gallery. At one door of the gallery, terracotta
images depicting Bhil death rituals and concept of world of the dead.
These images are dedicated to souls of the dead persons and in a
sense this a short-term habitat for these souls. These terracotta
images are generally installed on ground. But idea behind their
installation here has been conceived with a view to giving opportunity
to viewers to understand its basic concept with a different angle. It is
as if we are watching this world of the dead from any other plain or
the Earth from any other planet. There is also a possibility to watch
this world of the dead moving in the space like a constellation. There
is concept of a separate world for the dead in Bhil and Bhilal myths.
Invitation is extended to these dead persons in specific language of
the dead called Muruwa on special occasions. Earthen lamps are
also placed on these images on special occasion, which will be
 GALLERY 3
TRIBAL AESTHETIC
3.On the occasion of marriage, new daughter-in-law is
given brass bracelet or ring in tribal communities on
which symbols of productively like well/stairwell/ploughing
pair of bullocks/farmer/field etc are ingrained. This
bracelet is very small and is not worn. She keep the
bracelet in her hand at the time of preparing seeds. A
large image of this bracelet has been made in the gallery.
Besides marriage, rituals pertaining to birth of children
and death of people will also be shown in totality in the
gallery. Here, folklores linked to these, rituals and rites,
and all and aspects of its process through physical things
will be seen and understood.
 GALLERY 3
TRIBAL AESTHETIC
4.Efforts will also be made to give concrete shape to tribal
festivals and events related to seasons and cultivation,
dances, songs and attires linked to them. Process is also
underway to develop enlarged images of Bhils myths
about making percussion instruments, Gonds myth about
Badadev residing in Saja tree and making of a percussion
instrument called Bana from the same tree to appease
Badadev. Hollow of a dried tree trunk is being used to
give impression of a large dried up tree. It will offer a
better opportunity to understand natural vastness of
small percussion instrument Bana, capture its rhythm
and assimilate inherent intricacies of the instrument.
 GALLERY 4
TRIBAL SPIRITUAL WORLD
Images of a thorny tree has been made on the wall of
the corridor leading from Aesthetics gallery to
Devlok. Thorns remind people of pain and strength to
bear pain and remain unmoved by it is received from
Devlok, where this thorny corridor is leading.
 GALLERY 4
TRIBAL SPIRITUAL WORLD
1.It is hard nut to crack to conceptualise Devok in a
modern building and that too a Devlok where tribal
people avoid to enter a concrete place of worship
whose vague image is often seen in the form of a
rostrum, a raw stone, a fluttering flag, a stick, a pillar,
trident, earthen lamp or terracotta offering is seen on
the side of roads, amidst jungles, on the bank of a
small pond and sometimes on invisible boundary of
village in which deity is totally absent.
 GALLERY 4
TRIBAL SPIRITUAL WORLD
2.The shorthand language of symbols and signs in
which these tribal communities have writing
constitution of their Devlok borders on unending and
unlimited possibilities of time and space. Possibly for
this reasons they did never attempt to build any
massive Devlok since the most massive of a building
will be like a dust particle in the context of these
unlimited vastitude.
 GALLERY 4
TRIBAL SPIRITUAL WORLD
3.Therefore, all good and bad spirits of jungles,
ponds, rivers, hills have been invoked at Devlok
Gallery. These inputs and symbols as mentioned
above are rostrums beneath trees, terracotta
officerings, tridents, earthen lamps, Meghnath
Khamb of Korku tribe, Sarag Naseni of Gonds, Gul of
Bhils, Tatal Devs place, Dev Gudi of Baigas etc. There
are souls of ancestors, wandering spirits, spooks and
ghosts, innumerable saviour gods. Some are
protecting seeds, some bringing strayed cattle back
home, some will repair and restore broken hand or
leg and some god will free village from epidemic.
 GALLERY 4
TRIBAL SPIRITUAL WORLD
4.During visit to tribal Devlok gallery it become
explicit that it is more a world to experience than
watch. Therefore, it is more important to create that
particular climate for making it feel or experience in
which inanimate stone, a rostrum and offerings made
to gods can start breathing like an animate.
 GALLERY 4
TRIBAL SPIRITUAL WORLD
5.As said above earlier also, more than one storeys
have been prepared in each gallery so that visitors
can view it from various angles from below and
above. Deliberate effort has been made to disturb
the feeling if one is on the eartj and seeing
everything from some other plane. The same is the
reason behind covering iron grills ordinarily or
partially with barbed chains so that continuity of this
experience is not only maintained but also
strengthened the chains which are symbols of deitys
power.
 GALLERY 5
EXHIBITION AND GUEST
Under the initiative of setting up a gallery for guest
state, first of GALLERY
all life of tribal communities of
Chhattisgarh state is being depicted in this gallery.
That is why the corridor leading from Devlok to this
gallery has been converted into courtyard and
corridor adjoining it of Rajwar tribe of Sarguja in
Chhattisgarh. Rajwar dwellings style of bamboo and
clay lattices and way of coating is highly specialized
and has the honour of becoming an identity of not
only its community, but also entire state.
 GALLERY 5
EXHIBITION AND GUEST
1.Chhattisgarh is a tribal-dominated state and a large
population of theseGALLERY
tribes lives in Bastar area. All the
tribes have a specific role to play in preparing
Dussehra Rath over there at the time of Dussehra
right from identifying trees in jungles for it, upto
collection of leaves for covering it, driving nails
home, preparing various parts of the rath, brinking
Maoli Matas Chhatra from Jagdalpur, bending and
pulling it on roads etc. Efforts are being made to
grasp specialities of all the tribal communities by
linking them with this meaningful exhibit depicting
tribal affinity through physical objects.
 GALLERY 5
EXHIBITION AND GUEST
2.Besides, Maoli Mata ki Gudi, Sheetla Mata ka Sthan,
GALLERY
Karmseni Vraksh and a lane with dwellings of potter,
washerman, ironsmith/blacksmith and their tools
have also been displayed. Gudi of Adhishthata Devi
Danteashwari is inside the door of Rajwada of Bastar
and since there is no major role of Bastar royal family
in bringing Danteshwari Mata to Bastar, preparation
of Dussehra Rath, celebrating the festival in this way
and due to deep attachment of all the tribal
communities with these festivals and rituals, consent
has been reached give shape to entry door of the
gallery on the lines of entry gate of Bastar Rajwada.
 GALLERY 5
EXHIBITION AND GUEST
Pictorial and written documentation of games of
GALLERY
children of various tribal communities like Baiga,
Gond, Saharia, Kol, Korko, Bharia etc has been made
by visiting their areas. Since there are a number of
games of tribal children but only a few toys, this
display is being shaped with paintings, photographs
and other means well besides toys.
 GALLERY 5
EXHIBITION AND GUEST
1.Playing images have been prepared using
GALLERY
terracotta, hollows of dried gourd, hemp, papier-
mch etc. with a view to make understand nature of
game. Images jumping, swaying on trees can be seen
to understand games played on trees. Wrestling
images smeared in mud can also be seen. Images of
games played on ground like gippa, goti, chaupad
etc. will be shown on the ground.
 GALLERY 5
EXHIBITION AND GUEST
2.Use of earthen pitchers made by potters of western
Madhya Pradesh in GALLERY
improving gallerys acoustics and
lighting arrangements is worth noticing. Despite
being a part of indigenous knowledge, this can open
a new important and innovative vista of using the
technique in modern context. A partition made of
pieces of dry bamboo will be effective in maintaining
gallerys light, warmth and environment.
ENTERANCE GATE
ENTERANCE PLAZA
ENTERANCE TO MUSIUM
LIBERARY
SEMINAR HALL
AMPHITHEATRE
 CENTRAL
AMPHITHEATRE
AUDITORIUM
DORMITORY
CAFETERIA
OFFICES
OFFICES
 1.METAL
1.METAL
WORKSHOPS
WORKSHOP:-
WORKSHOP:-

2.TERACOTA
2.TERACOTA AND
AND EARTH
EARTH
WORKSHOP:-
WORKSHOP:-
 WORKSHOPS
1.WOOD
1.WOOD AND
AND BAMBOO
BAMBOO
WORKSHOP:-
WORKSHOP:-

2.PHOTOGRAPHY
2.PHOTOGRAPHY
WORKSHOP:-
WORKSHOP:-
 WORKSHOPS
1.HANDMADE
1.HANDMADE PAPER
PAPER DISPLAY
DISPLAY AND
AND
WORKSHOP:-
WORKSHOP:-

2.DANCE
2.DANCE AND
AND MUSIC
MUSIC
WORKSHOP:-
WORKSHOP:-
DISPLAY AREA
RESERVE COLLECTION
COURTYARDS
SHOPS AND STORES
STORAGE
PARKING