A Jain Priest
Another Dhurandhar postcard masterpiece, with the pale green background and statue of Lord Mahavir, the last Tirthankara of the Jain religion setting off the living priest in the foreground.
Another Dhurandhar postcard masterpiece, with the pale green background and statue of Lord Mahavir, the last Tirthankara of the Jain religion setting off the living priest in the foreground.
A postcard depicting hospitals in Mumbai used to treat some of the Indian troops who fought in World War I as part of the British Army.
A very early postcard printed in India, most likely by The Ravi Varma Press and drawn by its chief lithographer Paul Gerhardt.
A early Mumbai postcard, with ornament weaving together three photographs of the city.
A moneylender strutting through the public square, carrying the ominous red books he uses to chase debtors through the courts, the vibrant city his backdrop.
Among the earliest known postcards of Kolkata, by a local and likely Austrian,photographer. Note the four tiny titles below each vignette for those eager to know.
"Kodaikanal (Kody), though not so quite fashionable as Ooty," wrote Eustace Reynolds Hall in The Tourist's India (1907) "is rapidly coming into favour.
A postcard where the angle and architecture combine effectively to represent the role an institution once played in India's political and social life.
A less-typical image of an "Indian well," with a rugged sloping foreground that reminds the viewer how far beneath water could lie and the messiness of its extraction.
A hand-painted postcard; given that cards retailed for one anna around this time, maybe two, after materials, one can only imagine how little the bazaar artist was paid.
[Verso handwritten] "Cawnpore [Kanpur]. Dec.