About 8 months ago I had the incredible privilege of what I imagine will be a once in a lifetime trip to India. I would go there again in a heartbeat if it weren’t so very costly, but there are just too many other countries I also want to experience.  India hit me really hard.  I felt like I was caught up in a primordial stew of humanity and it has taken me six months, at least, to begin to process what I saw and felt in the overwhelming sub-continent. This is the first time I’ve gone public, so to speak, the first time I even broach the subject of India.  My blood pressure rises just thinking about that place.  It was wonderful and horrible, in about equal measure, about all of the time, in my experience.  I was knocked out by the beauty, elegance, and sophistication of many aspects of the country’s culture.  I was also knocked out by the human and animal rights violations I saw, the misogyny I felt, and the absolute lack of hope for the majority of that vast population.  The suffering and squalor I witnessed in India was overwhelming to me.  I always attempt to be, as Thoreau advised, a transparent eyeball, taking in as much as I can without judgment.  Indeed, in India I felt like a camera set on “panorama,” unable to adjust to the incoming sensory load. The sensitive tissue of my brain was absolutely overexposed.  I came home in a daze that lasted for months; I felt like I’d been hit up the side of the head with a cricket bat, psychologically speaking.  You know the Indians love cricket as much as the Brits, right?  The Brits brought the sport to India, and from what I saw, it took.

Still, India fascinates me and I like to think about it more and figure some things out.  I do that by writing.  So, today I continue my sojourn through the alphabet with art as its signifier.  The letter K is up next.  I think if I can begin with this Sesame Street approach, I should be fine (ha ha).

Lady with a Peacock

The following paragraphs are lifted more or less directly from Wikipedia. I have edited them to improve them and make them fit my style of writing.  But, I can take no credit for the facts. I would not be ready to do that, even if I were an expert on the subject!  I am still wobbling from my visit.

Kalighat pata is a style of Indian painting that derives its name from the place known as Kalighat (Bengali: কালীঘাট), a vibrant and densely populated section within Kolkata (Calcutta). One of the oldest neighborhoods in that teeming city, Kalighat has always been densely populated and extremely vibrant, with a rich history of cultural intermingling from the various foreign incursions it has experienced. The art known as Kalighat pata is characterized by generously curving figures of both men and women presented in an earthy, simplified, satirical style. It was developed during the 19th century, in response to the sudden prosperity brought to Calcutta by the East India Company trade, whereby many private businesses became incredibly wealthy.  Many of these nouveau riche  came from not particularly exalted caste backgrounds, so the higher classes tended to look down on them and their often very tasteless conspicuous consumption. The common people, known as babus, thus became subjects of that very noble human characteristic known as ridicule (okay, that is entirely Lauretta’s satirical addition). Thus, the ‘babu culture’ portrayed in Kalighat pata often shows inversions of the standard social order, such as maidservants upsetting norms by wearing shoes; sahibs in undignified postures; and domestic contretemps including depictions of wives beating — or leading about in the guise of pet goats or dogs — their husbands. Kalighat pata would also often show babu making use of European innovations, such as, for example, wearing European clothes, smoking western-styled pipes, or reading at imported desks. In fact, the Kalighat pata was only in part satirical for it also expresses the wonder that ordinary Bengalis felt upon exposure to these new and curious ways and objects of Western life.

Courtesan

Kalighat pata pictures are highly stylized, do not make use of perspective, and are usually pen and ink line drawings filled in with flat bright colors and typically use paper as the support. The practitioners were rarely educated, usually coming from a lineage of artisans. Kalighat patas are still made today, although genuine work is hard to come by. Can you imagine what Picasso would have done in his art had he visited India?  Wow, what a fun line of thought that is (Lauretta speaking).

  This is a Picasso, achieved without looking at Kalighat pata.  You can see where my idea came from!

The Kalighat pata art form is urban and largely secular, although gods and goddesses are sometimes depicted. When they do appear, they are no more romanticized than the humans in the paintings.

The demon Ravana fighting with the ape Hanuman, 1880

Okay, then, that didn’t hurt too much, did it?  I am still breathing so I know there is hope yet :-)).