ThoughtGallery.org > A Fantastic State of Ruin: The Painted Towns of Rajasthan

A Fantastic State of Ruin: The Painted Towns of Rajasthan

In this illustrated lecture, geographer and photographer David Zurick explores the connections between visual culture, landscape change, and the loss of cultural memory in small-town India.

For several years, Zurick has been making photographs in the Shekhawati region of Rajasthan, among little-known settlements that owe their origins to the trade caravans that once crossed the Thar Desert. In the 1800s, prosperous merchants financed the construction of ornate buildings in the towns and commissioned artists to decorate them with exquisite murals depicting local life and society. For generations, these painted buildings served the towns as trading houses, pleasure palaces, temples, caravansaries, and private homes. Eventually, the trading families left Shekhawati for India’s burgeoning cities and abandoned their opulent structures. Some were left in the charge of caretakers; squatters took up residence in many; most simply remain vacant. The buildings have slowly deteriorated over time, ravaged by climate and neglect, and now lie scattered among the desert settlements as an elegiac collection of beautiful living ruins – a crumbling open-air gallery set amid the ordinary affairs of small town life in rural India. As the mural-clad buildings of the painted towns disappear, the opportunity for local residents to engage with their cultural heritage declines, and the beauty of our lived-world is further diminished. In this presentation, Zurick discovers the unique richness of this remote vernacular architecture and highlights ongoing efforts to designate the region a UNESCO World Heritage Site.











When: Thu., Nov. 15, 2018 at 5:30 pm - 7:00 pm
Where: The New School
66 W. 12th St.
212-229-5108
Price: Free
Buy tickets/get more info now
See other events in these categories:

In this illustrated lecture, geographer and photographer David Zurick explores the connections between visual culture, landscape change, and the loss of cultural memory in small-town India.

For several years, Zurick has been making photographs in the Shekhawati region of Rajasthan, among little-known settlements that owe their origins to the trade caravans that once crossed the Thar Desert. In the 1800s, prosperous merchants financed the construction of ornate buildings in the towns and commissioned artists to decorate them with exquisite murals depicting local life and society. For generations, these painted buildings served the towns as trading houses, pleasure palaces, temples, caravansaries, and private homes. Eventually, the trading families left Shekhawati for India’s burgeoning cities and abandoned their opulent structures. Some were left in the charge of caretakers; squatters took up residence in many; most simply remain vacant. The buildings have slowly deteriorated over time, ravaged by climate and neglect, and now lie scattered among the desert settlements as an elegiac collection of beautiful living ruins – a crumbling open-air gallery set amid the ordinary affairs of small town life in rural India. As the mural-clad buildings of the painted towns disappear, the opportunity for local residents to engage with their cultural heritage declines, and the beauty of our lived-world is further diminished. In this presentation, Zurick discovers the unique richness of this remote vernacular architecture and highlights ongoing efforts to designate the region a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Buy tickets/get more info now