In this stunning painting, Durgabai turns the tiger into a cosmic image from which both the village and the forest grow, generating an interplay rather than an opposition between settlement and wilderness. The tiger’s tail grows into a tree heavy with purple birds while its legs sprout deer. Narmada and her sister Johilla play hopscotch while the women are shown sowing, threshing, winnowing, fetching water and wood. Other paintings that signify plenitude show the world as a cradling mandala marked by harmony among species with the home as its focal centre, where perhaps a bindu might have been featured in a traditional mandala. —N.Adajania