Tour of the British Art Museum Exhibit Painters, Ports, and Profits Artists and the East India Company 1850
Anneke Hathaway
Tour of the British Art Museum Exhibit
Painters,Ports, and Profits
Artists and the East India Company 1850
Wednesday, March 11
12 PM
This exhibition tells the story of artists from India, Britain, and China who worked in the era of one of the most powerful corporations in history. The British East India Company began in 1600 as a private trading enterprise but grew into a military and political force during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. To support its commercial and imperial goals, the Company encouraged its agents to commission art. Works of art depicted commodities, functioned as gifts to ease trade deals and build alliances, and visually recorded the places and societies where the Company traded and governed.
This exhibition, drawn from the YCBA’s rich collection of works from Asia, takes us on a journey through these port cities and into the worlds of artists. It shows how artists shaped, and were shaped by, the Company’s ruthless ventures while creating artworks of great beauty and innovation.
This tour will be led by our own Anneke Hathaway and is limited to ten people, so register now!