Miniature paintings of Jaipur

During our trip to Jaipur in December, I also got to meet some great artists who were award winners in the Miniature Art. This is handed down through generations.

We got a live demo of how they do it. The vibrant colours are from grinding semi precious stones like malachite, corals , conch shells, gold and silver on a rough surface, mixing it with a solution that ensures the colours hold fast, and they draw with a brush with a very fine bristle, that the artists make themselves...

The above outline of an elephant was done in a couple of minutes, including the preparation of the paint...

There were intricate and very very expensive paintings stacked and hung all over the stall....many were done on old stamp papers and looked centuries old...sadly we were requested not to take pictures of the beautiful paintings...

But I could not come away without atleast a small sample, and so I chose the painting of the elephant.