KALIGHAT SCHOOL, BENGAL, EAST INDIA, LATE 19TH CENTURY

This type of painting originates in the city of Calcutta in Bengal and especially from the vicinity of the Kalighat temple devoted to the goddess Kali. They are invariably executed in watercolour on mill made paper. They were initially produced by a caste of scroll painter-cum-potters who set up their stalls and shops around the temple, coining the term Kalighat paintings (Jain Jyotindra, Kalighat Painting, Images from a Changing World, Ahmedabad, 1999, p.9). In a period marked by industrialisation and colonial administration, therefore and thus rapid mass production and transportation combined with increasing population, the paintings rose from simple souvenir bought by relatively local visitors to products acquired by a vast pool of consumers. Jain writes that the paintings illustrates a story of transformation form folk art to popular culture (ibid,1999, p.17).

Our ten paintings illustrate well the external influences brought into Kalighat paintings. Both paintings of Shiva and Parvati and the seated Ganesh clearly demonstrate the use of shading. However, the painters resorted to this foreign device to emphasise volume as opposed to replicate a three-dimensional effect.

Series of Kalighat paintings sold at Christie's New York, 21-28 September 2017, lot 659 and Christie's South Kensington 28 April 2017, lot 285