In the northwest of Bangladesh, the Hindu village of Tikoil looks like a scene from a dream. Every mud house is covered in vivid motifs: flowers, birds, peacocks, and swirling geometric patterns. Courtyards bloom with color, and even cattle sheds are adorned with designs.
Known across the country as the Alpana Village, it has become a living gallery of rural imagination. The atmosphere is both intimate and theatrical, as if every wall and object has been claimed by creativity.
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For the people of Tikoil, painting is not a performance for outsiders; it is the simple act of creating beauty
The homes of Tikoil are made not of brick and cement but of compacted earth and straw, a technique as old as the region itself
Mud houses, common in the highlands, are practical and resilient: cool in the blazing summers, warm in the winters, and surprisingly durable in storms during monsoon season. Against these humble earthen walls, Alpana paintings flourish. Rain washes them away; time fades them into dust. Each season, they are reborn.
No record tells exactly when Alpana painting began in the region. Elders say Hindu brides once placed three white dots on their walls during weddings, expanding them into floral motifs
Over generations, those dots have blossomed into full-scale murals covering entire houses. Christian families — like the one in the picture — adopted the custom too, painting for weddings and the New Year.
Inside the homes of Tikoil, the colors extend beyond the walls. Painted motifs blend with bright curtains swaying in doorways and multicolored clothes hanging from the ceilings to dry
Together, the layers of fabric and the intricate murals create an atmosphere that feels almost theatrical, as if every room were dressed for a celebration. Patterns climb from the floors to the rafters, blending with textiles in a riot of hues that turns the most modest mud dwelling into a dazzling spectacle. Even the floors are decorated, leaving visitors with the uneasy feeling that every step risks treading on a work of art.
The art is inseparable from the land: red from clay, white from rice powder, green from leaves, blues and yellows from fruits or seeds. Preparing pigments can take days, soaking leaves or grinding grains
The process is painstaking, but it anchors Alpana in its environment. The impermanence of these natural colors is both their weakness and their strength. When the rains come, entire walls are washed clean. But this fragility ensures renewal. Each monsoon is an invitation to paint again, to invent new designs, to keep the tradition alive through practice.
Not every Alpana in Tikoil blooms with flowers or birds. Many walls carry geometric motifs, painted with the same steady hand and imagination
Behind this villager, a wall is covered in scalloped arcs, layered in precise rows like waves or scales. The repetition creates a rhythm that is both mathematical and poetic, transforming bare mud into a tapestry of order and harmony. Such geometric designs show the versatility of Alpana: it is not only an art of nature but also of abstraction, where symmetry and balance become part of daily life. For the artists, these shapes are no less meaningful — they embody patience, discipline, and a sense of timeless continuity.
For farming families in Bangladesh, the peacock is more than decoration. Its feathers symbolize beauty and abundance, while tradition links it to fertility, protection, and prosperity
Painted on mud walls, it becomes a hopeful emblem, a reminder that rural life, like the peacock’s plumage, can renew itself with every season.
The wall is a vivid chronicle of village life. Scenes unfold like a storybook: women drawing water, farmers leading oxen, cattle grazing under trees, and a man steering a bullock cart
These images are not abstract decoration — they mirror the reality of daily life in Tikoil, where most families are farmers. Agriculture is central to survival here: cattle provide milk and plough the land, women carry the responsibility of collecting water and food, and harvests dictate the rhythm of the year. Villagers celebrate their own work and honor the cycle of farming that sustains them
The walls also reflect political issues: Ela Mitra stands in front of Jatiyo Sriti Shoudho National Martyrs Memorial
She was a social activist and communist leader who played a pivotal role in championing the rights of farmers in the region where Alpana flourished. In the 1950s, she organized peasant movements, encouraging rural communities to resist exploitation. She shared their struggles and daily lives. Her advocacy was not only political but cultural, helping to protect practices like Alpana as part of the fabric of rural dignity.
In Tikoil, the Alpana tradition extends indoors: even the bedrooms are decorated with intricate patterns, their mud walls alive with color
Visitors are often surprised to be welcomed into such private spaces, but villagers show no embarrassment. Instead, they take pride in displaying the artistry of their everyday lives. For them, Alpana is not something to be hidden away but shared openly as part of their identity. In the village, beauty is inseparable from hospitality.
The paintings are everywhere. Step into a home in Tikoil and you’ll find Alpana not only on bedroom walls and clay courtyards, but also in kitchens, glowing with floral motifs beside clay stoves
Nothing is considered too ordinary to deserve decoration. For the villagers, Alpana is not a performance reserved only for festivals; it is a way of making every corner of life more beautiful, of surrounding the routines of cooking, worship, and work with color and imagination.
Today, the Alpana practice is universal in Tikoil. Women, particularly brides and mothers, carry the craft, passing it to their daughters not through instruction but through repetition
“When I was a child, I watched my mother painting on the wall. Then she let me draw small birds. As I grew older, I began to paint flowers, and now I decorate my own walls and even my own bedroom without my mother’s help,” says this young villager.
Even the cattle sheds in Tikoil are adorned with Alpana, their mud walls painted with the same care as homes. For villagers, animals are not just assets but companions in daily survival
They provide milk, labor, and, in many cases, dowry wealth. Decorating their shelters is seen as an act of respect, a way of honoring the creatures on which rural life depends. Bright patterns of flowers and trees climb across stalls, turning utilitarian spaces into places of dignity. In Alpana Village, beauty is not confined to humans: it extends to the animals that sustain them.
On the occasion of the Bengali New Year, Berger Paints Bangladesh Limited, the country’s leading manufacturer, launched a TV advert set in Tikoil
It celebrated the village’s artistry while offering a solution: synthetic paints that could make Alpana last far longer, resisting rain and sunrays. To Berger, it was a win-win. To the villagers, and to many beyond, it sounded like a threat to the very soul of the art. Within hours of the advert’s release, criticism erupted online. Critics also point out that Bangladesh already struggles with widespread exposure to chemicals, from pesticides in the fields to pollutants in water and air. Many illnesses in rural areas are linked to this toxic burden. Introducing synthetic paints into Alpana, they argue, only adds another layer to a public health problem the country has yet to resolve.
Not all villagers oppose synthetic paints outright. Some young women admit that chemical colors are tempting because they are cheaper and quicker than preparing natural pigments
Grinding rice into powder or soaking leaves for days takes time and resources they do not always have. When farming, childcare, and household work consume their days, the prospect of a mural that survives the monsoon can feel less like betrayal and more like relief. The tension between heritage and survival runs through every brushstroke: the pride of tradition against the pressures of poverty.
The Hindu women who paint do not see Alpana as a way to earn a living, but as a duty to beauty, community, and tradition
Visitors who step inside their homes are often invited to sign a guest book, where an expression of wonder is valued far more than a donation. “We’re happy to see visitors taking so many pictures!” this resident explains. No one will hassle you for money, even though it would be easy to do so in a place whose unique beauty could so readily attract tourists. Commerce is not the purpose of covering walls in color. The purpose is pride and the simple act of painting itself.
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