aper Jewels Postcards from the Raj

 

Discussion and launch of the book by Omar Khan (Mapin Publishing & The Alkazi Collection of Photography, 2018)

 

 

 

Introduction: Rahaab Allana

 

 

 

Illustrated presentation by Omar Khan, Chief Technology Officer, Common Sense Media, San Francisco, avid historian, award-winning web designer and aspiring filmmaker who runs the website Harappa.com

 

 

 

Followed by a conversation with Dr. Malavika Karlekar

 

 

 

Paper Jewels is the story of postcards during the Raj and the first book on the subject. It uncovers such gems as the early postcards of the great Indian painter M. V. Dhurandhar and the Ravi Varma Press in Mumbai, the exceptional work of an early Austrian lithographer in Kolkata, a British photographer in Peshawar, and Indian studios in Jaipur, Kashmir, Delhi, Lahore, Madras, Karachi and elsewhere.

 

 

 

It is organized by place into a dozen chapters. The essays cover the key themes important to postcard publishing—religion, dancers, teas and soaps, famines, fakirs, humour, warfare and the role of postcards in the Independence movement. It tells the stories of the first postcard publishers of the subcontinent between 1892 and 1947, most of whose images have not been seen since they were published a century ago