Company School" Metamorphic Costume Cards, Watercolors/Gouache on Mica, depicting various Indian characters -- tradespeople and servants

NA. Good. N.d. Circa 1830 to 1850. Nine cards, eight of which are overlay cards, deliberately leaving out a face, and one, the base card, this one featuring two heads, one to apply to the standing figures, of which we have two, and the other, to the kneeling/seated ones, or the other six overlays. The figure's gender is of no consequence -- the underlying head is gender-free, or in today's parlance, non-conforming. The cards all measure 11 by 7.5 cm. Scarce genre. One comes upon Company School mica painted figures with some regularity, and metamorphic costume overlay cards, the same, but the two genres combined are encountered far far less. These Indian paintings on mica from the early to mid-19th Century have become known as "Company School" paintings because they were typically produced for employees of the East India Company as souvenirs. The genre was supposedly emulating the painting on glass which was the rage in Europe at the time. The nature of mica dictated the size of these paintings. While mica has the wonderful ability to be shaved off into thin slices or sheets, these sheets are also brittle and easily fracture, making a larger format impractical. And indeed, these cards have their share of cracks and fissures, with one suffering a sizeable bite out of its corner, but fortunately, none of these defects impact the essential picture created laying one card atop the base. The bottom card has a painted background, and most of the overlay cards add to the background with drapery, flooring and/or props that go along with the profession and type of person being depicted. The subject matter of these cards include a female fruit seller, a squating man grilling with spits, a scribe, seated women street vendor with scales, two cards with musicians, etc. Wearen't sure what all of the Indians are occupied with, we confess.