A small state, a large art
Guler was founded in 1405 by a branch of the Katoch family of Kangra and held a modest territory in the valley. Its political history is unremarkable; its artistic importance is out of all proportion to its size.
In the early eighteenth century a family of painters from Kashmir settled at Guler under the patronage of Raja Dalip Singh and his successor Govardhan Chand. The elder painter Pandit Seu had two sons, Manaku and Nainsukh, and between them they transformed Pahari painting from the bold, flat, intense Basohli manner into something softer, more naturalistic and more psychologically observant.
Nainsukh
Nainsukh left Guler to work for Balwant Singh of Jasrota, and the paintings he made of that minor prince — shaving, listening to music, inspecting a building, huddled in a quilt in winter, dying — are unlike anything else in Indian art: intimate portraits of an ordinary life, drawn over years by a painter who evidently knew his subject well.
The descendants of this workshop moved to Kangra, Chamba, Basohli and Garhwal, and the Kangra school of Sansar Chand's court was their work. Almost the whole of later Pahari painting comes from one family in one small state.
Guler entered British protection in 1846 and acceded to India in 1948.
Further reading
- Asher, Catherine B. India Before Europe. Cambridge University Press, 2006
- Blurton, T. Richard. Hindu Art. Harvard University Press, 1993
- Davis, Richard H. Lives of Indian Images. Princeton University Press, 1997
- Elgood, Heather. Hinduism and the Religious Arts. Cassell, 1999
- Michell, George. The Hindu Temple: An Introduction to Its Meaning and Forms. University of Chicago Press, 1988
See also
This entry was last revised on 1 August 2026.