I sold a 3x4 ft Mithila painting for ₹7,000 and then did the full maths

One of my bigger pieces, a marriage scene with the fish and the mango tree, went to a buyer in Delhi for ₹7,000. That sounds respectable until you sit and count the days. Preparation of the paper, grinding the colours, the fine line work, then the filling. I worked maybe four hours each day for nine days. That is thirty-six hours. Seven thousand divided by thirty-six comes to about ₹194 an hour. And that is before the cost of the handmade paper and the natural pigments, which are not cheap since the good sources became difficult.

My mother used to say we must never sell a painting for less than the soul it carries. But the soul does not pay for the grandson's school books. I have been keeping this art alive my whole life and still I cannot name a fair price for it. When a cooperative takes a cut and the buyer haggles, I am left asking myself if my grandmother's line work is worth less than a plumber's visit.

I raised my price to ₹8,500 this month. I am scared to go higher because the buyers are not many. But I have decided the art will not answer to the shame of being cheap any longer. If it sells, good. If not, the painting stays with me in the house where it was made, and that is also something.

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Inês Costa·2h

That arithmetic is a hard thing to sit with, and I don't think any of us who does this work by hand escapes it. I make prints where the sun does half the labour, and even then people rarely understand that the paper, the chemistry, the days of waiting and failing count too.

But the part that stays with me is your mother's words, cut off there. That's the real weight. Nine days of your life is not ₹194 an hour, whatever the buyer believes. I hope you keep the paintings. Someone always pays too little, but the work itself remembers the care.

Kasia Nowak·1h

The mother's line is the part that got me too. "Never sell for less than the days it took." That's such a clean way to say it, and then the rent makes liars of us all. I don't think there's a real balance to be found, only the hoping that the next one goes to someone who sees it. But I like what you said about the work remembering the care. That's true. I've sold pieces cheap and regretted it for weeks, but I've never once regretted the hours themselves.

Ramesh JhaOP·5m

That is kind of you to say, and you have caught the heart of it. The hours themselves I have never once regretted, not even the ones that earned nothing. There is a peace in the doing that the selling cannot touch. But yes, the rent is a loud voice in the room, and it is hard to hear your mother's words over it.

What you said about the next one going to someone who sees it, that is my only hope also. Sometimes one person comes who stands and looks and understands what the fish and the mango tree mean, and then the cheap sale of last month does not weigh so heavy. I hope that person finds you too, ji.

Ramesh JhaOP·1h

The prints, I understand what you are saying. The sun does half the labour but it does not grind the pigment or wait for the paint to set. Even that much work is work. I have been thinking also that the hours are only half the story. The skill itself comes from my grandmother's mother, so who prices that. You cannot charge for nine days when the knowledge is many generations old, but somebody must pay something for it, otherwise the knowledge ends with us.

You are kind to say keep the paintings. I have kept a few, the ones where the line came out exactly as I saw it in my mind. Those are not for sale. The rest must go, so that the children in my class can afford their colours. That is the trade. 🙏

Camille Laurent·2h

This maths is brutal and familiar. I did the same arithmetic on a large canvas a few years back and nearly stopped painting for good. You spend nine days on something and the buyer pays for the thing, not the time in it, and never will.

The part that really lands for me is the pigments. People who don't paint have no idea what natural materials cost now, or what it means that good sources are disappearing. That's not just money, that's the tradition itself getting more expensive to keep alive, and it gets passed along to you alone.

I don't have an answer. But your mother's words were cut off there, and I suspect she was wiser than the Delhi market. I hope you keep the marriage scene tradition going regardless, because when the line work is done properly, that fish and mango tree carry a hundred years of meaning and no one prices that in.

Ramesh JhaOP·1h

You are right about the mother's words. She used to say we must never sell a painting for less than the days it took, but then the rent also must be paid, so where is the balance. My mother did this same calculation her whole life and her mother before her. The difference now is that the people who understood the cost, the neighbours, the ones who knew what the work meant, they are fewer. The buyer in Delhi sees a pretty thing for the wall, not the nine days and the grinding and the prayer that goes into it.

You asked about the pigments being the tradition itself getting harder to keep alive. That is exactly it. The indigo, the lamp soot, the rice paste, the good red earth, they were never just colours. Now the old sources are gone and I am using tube colours for some things, which I never thought I would do. Each time I reach for the tube instead of grinding, a little of my mother's hand goes out of the picture.

But we keep going. Because if we stop, the line stops with us. That I cannot allow. 🙏