It is this suavely delicate art which now appears in Garhwal.  Among the Guler painters was a master-artist and although his first Garhwal pictures are concerned with passionate romance, devotion to Krishna quickly becomes apparent.[107] The great Alaknanda River which roared through Srinagar, the capital, had a special fascination for him and just as Leonardo da Vinci evinced at one time a passionate interest in springing curls, the Guler artist found a special excitement in winding eddies and dashing water.  The result was a sudden new interpretation of the Krishna theme.  In two pictures where Krishna is shown quelling the snake Kaliya,[108] all the Guler qualities of elegant naturalism are abundantly present.  Each figure has a smooth suavity and in every face there appears a look of calm adoration.  It is the swirling, curling water, however, which gives the pictures their special Garhwal quality.  The play of water evokes a melody of line and the result is a sense of upsurging joy.  A similar religious exaltation marks other pictures by this master.  At some time he appears to have been commissioned to illustrate the tale of Sudama the poor Brahman whose tattered hovel is changed by Krishna into a golden palace.  He was evidently assisted by a weaker painter but in the pictures which are clearly his own work, the same quality of lyrical incantation appears.  As Sudama journeys to Dwarka Krishna’s golden city, his heart swoons with adoration, the hills, trees and ocean appear to dance about him and once again, the linear music of the composition engenders a feeling of supreme ecstasy.[109] We do not know which member of the Garhwal court acted as his patron—­it is even possible that it was not the ruler himself but his consort, the Guler princess whom he had married in about the year 1770.  What, at any rate, is clear is that at least one lively adorer of Krishna existed at the Garhwal court and that until the Gurkha invasions of 1803, there were other painters, besides the master-artist, who were similarly encouraged to interpret the Krishna theme.[110] Their style was clearly influenced by that of the master but in their use of slender leafless branches and towering spikes of blossom, they developed a special Garhwal imagery designed to suggest the slender beauty of love-enchanted girls.  After the expulsion of the Gurkhas in 1816, a new Raja revived Garhwal painting.  Krishna the lover was once again portrayed and until the middle of the nineteenth century, pictures continued to be produced blending the delights of courtly passion with adoration of God.

It was in the state of Kangra, however, that the greatest developments occurred.  In 1775, the young Sansar Chand became Raja, and despite his extreme youth, quickly acquired mastery of the Kangra court.  It is unlikely that artists were immediately summoned, but certainly by 1780 a flourishing school of painters had come into existence.[111] As at Garhwal, the artists of Kangra came originally from Guler and thus a similar