art

Albert Hall Museum in Jaipur

The previous post on the Jaipur trip is linked here!

On the last day and a half we managed to see many more places.

We visited Albert hall, which was touted as the local museum. It was a gloomy looking place with not enough lighting, but it did have a lot of interesting pieces in it ranging from 800 AD to the early 1900's, from all over the world. Things that were originally collected by Kings and later curated by "Abert"! 

Going through a museum that is not air conditioned, is dark and dingy on a hot summer day, is not a good idea. The kids refused to move past the first two rooms and sat down on the floor to strike! They said "we will pass on this one appa! please see what you want, and pick us up from this room!"

Here are a few things that I thought were either interesting or unique to this museum.. 

The kids stayed put in that room with the mummy while my FIL and me wandered on..Tons of laquerware, other utensils and decorative vases that occupied a few rooms. If you are into Vases, this might be your place to visit!

Then there were the statues from the late 700's to 1300's. If you are into anything "Tantric"... this might also be the place for you to visit!

This door jamb thingy in the picture below the sign was massive and intricate. Would have loved to see the entire temple though.

I put two and two together after seeing this panel and visiting Abaneri later on. Could not comprehend what the size of the real structures have to be till the next day..

These statues with gold plating were tiny but exquisite. If you have all the money at your disposal, you can patronize such arts!

Talk of beheadings! I could not get the full story from this miniature figurine but the godess seems to be very happy to have slain the buffallo which apparently is symbolic of the bufallo demon king. Good thing the kids stayed in the room with the mummies. I would have had to explain a lot of things without any "konaar notes"!

Finally, there was a display of musical instruments from 1700-1800 and this thing was called a Guitar! Thought that was funny. The guitar surely evolved in the last few hundred years.

The biggest draw though, was the pigeons outside. Thousands of them! We watched a man feed them and a kid chase them around every 2 minutes. Took a slow-motion video of this on the iPhone 5S and had lost the slo-mo effect. Thanks to some edits on iMovie have gotten it to look close to the original.. 

 We went on to see the Abaneri wells. That has to be a post in itself! 

Our walkway aka Art Gallery

Most of the artistic creations of Jr. and the little one from their school work are displayed on the doors of our cabinets in the garage. Granted it is not organized neatly but it is a treat to pull into the garage and stare at some of their early work. Brings back memories and makes you forget long work days at the same time. 

We do update the garage drawings on a rotational basis, once a quarter or when daddy feels like it.

The inside of the house is another matter. The walkway is reserved for work they do in art class and we are adding to the collection every month or so. 

Here is the little one's latest work .. 

and our walkway as of today

The display helps motivate them because everytime someone visits our house, they go to the walkway to see the additions and ask the kids questions and encourage their work. 

In the process, I am also learning how to improve the "display" by spacing things out right on the walls and re-arranging pictures in portrait vs. landscape format etc.

They do have other works on glass and on "rocks". They are both painting rocks now. Those are going to be tricky to display. Planning to buy little ledges that go on the wall and put the rocks on top. 

That will have to wait for a few weeks!