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Making history fun. One tweet at a time.

Feb 17, 2022, 10 tweets

Today, we go on a short Art History tour! India has several unique painting styles - one of which is Kalighat Paintings. Started in a small scale by artists around the Kalighat temple in Calcutta to be taken back as souvenirs by the devotees, today its an art form by itself!

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As one would expect, it started mainly with mythological themes but over time interest grew & even daily life started getting depicted. British interest grew & today many of the Kalighat paintings are in museums in Britain. Lets look at a few of them

Ravana & Hanuman c 1880

You can see an unique range of locally available colours and simple but beautiful designs

Duryodhana fighting Bheema

Kali holding demon's head

Narasimha killing Hiranyakashibu

Daily Life - A fighting couple

Barber cleaning a woman's ear

Cat stealing a prawn

Ganesha (At the National Museum, Wales)

Its quite cheap to get a Kalighat painting for yourself on your next visit to Kolkata. Its quite fun and you can roam around different shops to make your selection.

Thats a short tour of a interesting piece of Indian art history for you! Share if you liked it & follow for more

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