Kalighat Paintings

Kalighat painting evolved as a unique painting style in the rapidly urbanizing cityscape of 19th-century Kolkata. Reflecting a new language, in which old and new techniques came together, these paintings recorded the changes in lifestyles, values, and a new visual vocabulary brought forth by lithographic presses and studio photography.
The artists who developed the now famous Kalighat painting style were traditional scroll painters (patuas) who migrated from rural Bengal and settled in the vicinity of the Kalighat temple in Kolkata. In catering to the transient, urban populace, these artists let go of their linear narrative style¬s and adopted single pictures with one or two figures. The traditionally inherited techniques and iconography were blended with the use of watercolours and Western academic shading, to portray scenes of a changing society.
This volume accompanied the touring exhibition ‘Kalighat Paintings’ organized in 2011 by the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, in collaboration with the Victoria Memorial Hall, Kolkata. The V&A holds the single largest collection of Kalighat paintings in the world, and this was the first exhibition to show the collection in India. Combining the best examples from the V&A with those from the VMH, the works were exhibited alongside works by today’s practising artists. The supporting scholarly essays included in the book reveal the importance of these collections, and also highlight the era in which this style of painting thrived, while also describing the techniques used by the patuas.