Museum objects, artifacts, and archival items from the Sarmaya collection.
John Burke was an Irish photographer who took some of the earliest photos ever of Afghanistan. Employed as a tradesman in his homeland, he applied to the British Army to work as an official photographer; he’s best known for his work during the second Anglo-Afghan war. Later, he travelled to Afghanistan at his own expense,… Read more »
First published in 1689, this book was written by a surgeon who is best remembered today for his descriptions of seventeenth-century India and Persia. The publication was feted for its accuracy and wealth of cartographical detail.
Hailing from the Asnona village of Portuguese Goa, A.X. Trindade was a student of one of the earliest batches of Sir J.J. School of Art, Bombay, and was trained in the classical style of academic realism. Like all students trained in the school during this period, he was an expert in various mediums like watercolour,… Read more »
The Hoysalas are perhaps best known for the beautiful works of architecture and sculpture they left behind. A Kannadiga empire that ruled areas of southern Deccan and the Cauvery valley between the 11th and 14th centuries CE, their origins have been traced to a group of hill-dwellers hailing from the region near present-day Halebid. Legend… Read more »
A keen amateur photographer and a member of the Bombay Photographic Society in 1854, Colonel Thomas H Biggs actually had a pretty serious day job. He joined as an officer of the Bombay Artillery in 1841 and was later made captain. In 1855, the Bombay government commissioned him to document the architectural and archaeological sites… Read more »
Murad Bakhsh (1624-1661) was the youngest son of Shah Jahan. He was very successful in the initial stages of the Balkh-Badakhshan campaign of 1646, but when he left the expedition to return to Agra, it created a permanent rift between him and his father and resulted in his expulsion from the Mughal court. Later, Murad… Read more »
Engraving or etching is the process of deriving a print on paper from an engraved surface made of wood, metal or stone. There are many ways to create an engraved print such as a linocut, woodcut or block-print—Indians have been printing in this way from the 16th century. Prints gained massive popularity because you could… Read more »
The Gond community is regarded as one of the oldest and largest surviving adivasi communities of India. The term Gond is derived from the word ‘Kond’ meaning ‘green mountains’; a majority of the people live in the lush forested regions of Madhya Pradesh, but there are also some Gonds to be found in pockets of… Read more »
The first Indian Uprising broke out in the East India Company’s army in May, 1857 and the campaign to suppress it lasted till April 1859. The course of the Uprising followed five distinct phases; first came the outbreak and the measures taken immediately; this was followed by the capture of Delhi and the two reliefs… Read more »
The Pattachitra tradition practiced in Odisha and West Bengal is the art of creating religious paintings on fabric, walls, palm leaves or manuscripts. The tradition grew out of ornamenting the sanctum sanctorum of the Jagannatha Temple in Puri, Odisha and eventually spilled out onto different surfaces. Pattachitras were originally created by the chitrakara class of… Read more »
The patachitra tradition practiced in Orissa and West Bengal is the art of creating religious paintings on cloth, wall, palm-leaf or manuscripts. The tradition grew out of ornamenting the sanctum sanctorum of the Jagannatha Temple in Puri, eventually branching out into other domains. They were originally created by the artist (chitrakara) class of Orissa called… Read more »
This is a gold mohur issued by Alamgir II (1699-1759) and minted in Shahjahanabad. Alamgir II was a Mughal Emperor, who ruled from the capital of Delhi during the latter part of the 18th century. Being raised to the throne at the age of fifty-five, he was a relatively weak and incapable ruler, and was… Read more »
Thomas H. Sherratt’s original engraving and etching, The Storming of Delhi is based upon a design created by Matthew Somerville Morgan (M. S. Morgan), depicting the siege of Kashmiri Gate (Delhi) during the Uprising of 1857. After weeks of planning from the ridge under the leadership of John Nicholson, the British captured the city of… Read more »
The Phad is a tradition of creating religious scroll paintings, practiced by the Bhopa tribal community of Rajasthan. They are primarily made for two folk deities, Pabuji and Devnarayan. The creation of the phad is just one part of the entire process—the cloth is actually the main prop of a larger ritualistic performance. Singer-priests roam… Read more »
This is an engraving after an older one by Jean Bellin, the official engraver and cartographer of the king of France. It is a town plan of Goa in the panorama view including mountains, trees, buildings, elephants, ships in the harbor, boats resting on the shore, and religious buildings. It depicts the fort of Goa,… Read more »
Souza brings a touch of the unexpected, even a note of the odd, to the table in this rendition of the Supper at Emmaus, where a resurrected Jesus reveals himself to two of his followers. The disciples faces are disfigured in a way that references the artist’s cubist tendencies. FN Souza believed that art offered… Read more »
Jamini Roy was probably the first artist to depict Christ in an Indian vocabulary. He was looking to test the effectiveness of his bold line and flat colour technique on a subject which was remote from his personal life. Being an orthodox Hindu who had never read the old or new testaments, Roy saw the… Read more »
The theme of this painting is the ‘Crucifixion of Christ’. The artwork deliberately shifts our focus to Christ’s harsh, pained facial expressions by eliminating his nailed hands and legs, bleeding on the cross. Jogen Chowdhury’s Christ conveys intense human emotions of distress, agony and pain through both the body and the face. A white halo… Read more »
This pattachitra describes Krishna and Balarama leaving Vrindavan to go to Dwarka – where Krishna settled and ruled as king. Gopis can be seen lining ahead of the chariot and bidding him farewell. Since this a modern rendition of the legend the figures are actually shown waving to each other – a gesture borrowed from… Read more »
This is a Gond painting created in the tribal regions of Madhya Pradesh. A ritualistic mural tradition of the Gondi tribe, Gond paintings are done on paper with synthetic colours now. This image created by Rajkumar Shyam depicts a tribal goddess called “Maindo Mai”. She holds a broom and a trident in her two arms,… Read more »