In the light of continuing debates on Indian women’s mobility and choices, young Mithila painter from Bihar, India, Amrita Das offers a disarmingly fresh perspective on being female and an artist in the making. Her visual tale is gentle yet resolute, the art treading a fine balance between tradition and innovation. In the process, she manages to steer the Mithila tradition of women’s art away from the domesticity of its origins to actually questioning the traditional confines of women’s lives. Hope is a Girl Selling Fruit is a reflective account of a young woman’s thoughts and feelings as she comes into contact with the larger world. Ideal reading for young people, grappling with issues of adolescence, identity and freedom.
