Dig a little deeper into India’s art and heritage, uncover lesser-known stories and expert insight on everything from the popular to the esoteric.
The Ahoms outlasted most other medieval Indian dynasties and gave their name to the state of Assam, but an account of their empire barely finds mention in mainstream culture. Here’s 10 facts that will get you curious to learn more about this northeastern empire
Understand Indian empires through their temples, art and even hairstyles in this reading list drawn from the Sarmaya library
What the chain of diamonds trickling from the marketplaces of Golconda tells us about the dynasties that branded and traded, and won and lost them
Opulently gilded and calligraphed, filled with a patchwork of intricately detailed imagery, evoking wonder and awe, the muraqqa’ tells unforgettable tales of royalty
Powerful pieces of imagery from personal albums are setting down in history what is otherwise undocumented and therefore unacknowledged, acting as the nuanced subtext that is drastically missing from our public rhetoric. We talk to the curators of these intimate archives
An initiation into the Sarmaya team involves the confrontation of and acclimating to certain books from our library. New ‘uns are told this is necessary reading meant to familiarise them with the genres of the collection. Each object inhabits a world that is resonant and multi-faceted and it’s impossible to know where to start. “Today… Read more »
Mithila artist Pushpa Kumari’s aesthetic genius combines the traditional with the contemporary, and the personal with the political
The festival of light fast approaches, which of course reminds us of the legend behind the pomp and its heroine, Sita. Queen, Goddess, icon, Sita is a woman exemplar, revered for her beauty, grace and loyalty. But in modern times, Sita has had to pass frequent tests of feminist fire. If she is denigrated, it’s… Read more »
Dulari Devi is an artist but she wasn’t always one. This is how the story begins in her autobiographical children’s book, Following My Paint Brush, published by Tara Books, an independent publishing house that brings art by Indian women, folk and indigenous artists to young readers. Coming from a community of fisherfolk in Bihar, Dulari… Read more »
This text and images below are reproduced with permission from the author Bhaskar Koirala and Nepali Times and it was originally published on the Nepali Times website King Harisingh Deva of Simraongarh must have sat on his heavy-set chair while a pair of household staff was cross-legged on the black chlorite stone floor massaging… Read more »
A conversation with author and historian Rosie Llewellyn-Jones about a city whose beauty decayed and grandeur faded even as history forgot its name
Kuhu Kopariha enters the cinematic universe of India’s great auteur to meet his women, see them through his eyes, and find her own reflection
An interview with Dr Xavier Bray of the Wallace Collection to understand how Bengal came to play an important role in the evolution of the striking Company School paintings
A land of memory and vision. A city of joy and heartbreak. A capsule of what was and what could have been. The cinemascape of Calcutta shows us all this and more
Something is daunted when one attempts to remember the bequests of India’s early multi-hyphenate on his death anniversary. A good profile should be a seamless whole of the inner and outer life of the poet, Rabindranath Tagore had said, commenting on Tennyson’s biography by his son, which he admonished for being full of trivialities. But… Read more »
A highly subjective list of reads to wrap you snugly in a cocoon of Calcutta-coloured threads
With his sharp wit and satirical yet sympathetic portrayals of daily life, Indian artist and cartoonist Mario de Miranda is the perfect companion during a lockdown. These illustrations in our StoryLTD auction, The World of Mario, would be sure to add some humour to your walls, and are as relevant as ever to the strange… Read more »
I am desperately late to the Gulabo Sitabo Netflix watch party (or Amazon in this case), but in my defence it was catching virtual dust while sitting at the very top of my watchlist and this is just how movie screenings and time work now. How ironic it is that this film was released in… Read more »
We’ve settled into routines now and a big part of that is just vegging out on the couch, in front of a screen or in bed with a novel. It feels like all we’ve done this lockdown is read and reread books we love and binge-watch shows on Netflix. And so we have a new… Read more »
Here we share photographs from our archive, some over a hundred years old, of these iconic Indian landmarks and the unforgettable songs that will always stir our memories of the place