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European artists made the stepped riverfront of Banaras—now usually called Varanasi—recognizable to audiences in Britain and Europe through paintings and, especially, widely circulated prints. Their views of temples, palaces, steps and river life offered memorable images of the city, but they were shaped by European tastes and colonial routes, not neutral records of everything Banaras was.
How did European artists depict the ghats of Banaras?
They often treated the riverfront as a sweeping architectural scene: the Ganges in the foreground, with flights of steps, temples and palaces rising behind it. The ghats’ dense built setting gave landscape artists a distinctive subject that could be recognized at a glance. The National Army Museum’s record for Thomas Daniell’s coloured aquatint Dusasmade Gaut, at Benares, on the Ganges identifies the scene as Dasasvamedha Ghat and describes the religious setting of the riverfront: National Army Museum object record.
Banaras appeared across more than one medium. The Government of India’s National Gallery of Modern Art catalogs Thomas Daniell’s oil painting Banaras: The Manikarnika Ghat as circa 1800: National Gallery of Modern Art collection record. British Library catalogue results also list Daniell watercolours of the riverfront, including a Shivala Ghat scene from 1789: British Library Archives and Manuscripts Catalogue. These records show the ghats recurring as subjects in prints, oils and watercolours.
How did prints make Benares known in Britain?
Prints could carry a scene far beyond the artist’s original sketch or painting. The South Asia Collection explains that European travelers’ drawings and watercolours were often translated into prints, making images more accessible to people at home. It describes the result as “armchair tourism”: the public could encounter an imagined India through pictures without having traveled there. Read its account of European artists and print culture in South Asia: The South Asia Collection.
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- Artist: Tradelink Inhouse Artist
- Title: Banaras Ghat POD5
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Hodges helped establish a market for Indian views
William Hodges was the first professional British landscape artist to visit India, according to the South Asia Collection. With East India Company support, he traveled there from 1780 to 1783. His Select Views of India, made from his sketches, comprised 48 aquatints. The series helped build British interest in visual accounts of the subcontinent and set an early precedent for turning travel and observation into a published landscape collection.
The Daniells made the ghat view repeatable
Thomas Daniell and his nephew William traveled in India from 1786 to 1793. After returning to London, they produced Oriental Scenery, a six-volume series published from 1795 to 1815. The South Asia Collection records 144 coloured aquatints in the series. The National Army Museum dates its coloured Dasasvamedha Ghat plate to March 1795, providing a specific example of a Banaras riverfront scene entering a commercial print series.
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The National Army Museum calls Oriental Scenery “one of the first popular artistic endeavours to bring home to people in Britain the true wonders of Indian architecture, landscapes and people.” That is the museum’s curatorial description of the publication’s significance, not a measure of how many people saw or bought the prints.
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Why did European artists paint Varanasi’s riverfront?
The ghats offered a concentrated visual subject: monumental architecture, a dramatic river edge and activity associated with religious life. For artists seeking scenes that would appeal to European patrons, they provided both striking forms and a setting that could be presented as unfamiliar to audiences at home. The Daniells’ work was connected to the East India Company’s presence in India: the South Asia Collection notes that the brothers secured Company permission to travel. Hodges, too, traveled on a Company salary.
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- Artist: Tradelink Inhouse Artist
- Title: Banaras Ghat POD1552
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That institutional context matters, but it does not mean every compositional choice can be reduced to one motive. The pictures emerged through several linked stages: travel and observation, artistic selection, printmaking, and publication for a European audience. Their view of Banaras reflects both the city and the conditions under which European artists encountered and represented it.
What did the picturesque style leave in and leave out?
European artists often used picturesque conventions to make unfamiliar landscapes legible and appealing to Western viewers. The South Asia Collection notes that such views could be idealized, with muted tones, an emphasis on ruins and landscapes made to appear empty. A carefully composed ghat panorama could therefore record real buildings while also suppressing the density and movement of lived experience.
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- Matte-finish art print on smooth heavyweight paper with printed artwork. Unframed.
- Printed using a digital process to produce clear detail and balanced color on art paper. Suitable for display in indoor environments.
- Unframed print in a standard size compatible with many ready-made frames. Check frame opening and mat size before purchase to confirm fit.
- The artwork is printed on 9 x 12 in (23 x 31 cm) paper. The image area measures 8.5 x 11.5 in (22 x 29 cm) and is centered with a surrounding white border to accommodate standard framing requirements.
- Each print is produced individually for consistent output and accurate color. Packaged with protective materials to help maintain condition during handling and transit.
- What the images can show: the forms and arrangement of particular buildings and ghats as an artist recorded them at a particular time.
- What their framing can obscure: the people, activity and complexity that a picturesque composition might minimize or omit.
- What their circulation reveals: how artists, patrons and print markets in Europe shaped the images of India available to distant viewers.
These works are valuable visual records, but they should be read as crafted interpretations rather than transparent windows onto the whole city.
What does “signature image” mean here?
It means that repeated depictions and circulation made the ghats a recognizable motif in European visual culture. Hodges’s earlier aquatints helped establish an appetite for published views of India; the Daniells’ large, multi-volume project carried images of Indian architecture and landscapes to a broader home audience. The surviving records establish repeated representation across media and the scale of the Daniells’ publication, but they do not quantify print sales or audience size, or prove that all viewers understood Banaras through these images.
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- Matte-finish art print on heavyweight paper with printed artwork. Unframed.
- Printed using pigmented inks for stable color reproduction and clear detail. Suitable for display in indoor environments such as homes, offices, or studios.
- Unframed print in a standard size compatible with many ready-made frames. Check frame opening and mat size before purchase to confirm fit.
- Paper size is 11 x 14 inches (28 x 36 cm) with an image area of 10 x 13 inches (25 x 33 cm), including a white border for framing.
- Each print is produced individually for consistent output and accurate color. Packaged with protective materials to help maintain condition during handling and transit.
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