Book Sketch : Habitats

 Some glimpses of a little project I am working on, on the side. Thinking about habitats, and how the animals around us our letting us live in their space, not the other way around. They were here first, and the sooner we understand that, the better.

Work in Progress: Book of Mughal Botanicals

This project has been a long time coming. I have been thinking about this and related ideas for a few years now. And for the past two years have finally put thought down to paper, and come up with the illustrations and some text for the final book. The book will focus on the plants that are indigenous to India–not traded or brought in by the British; plants that have no commercial value and were grown for their beauty and exuberance.

The book explores how our relationship with nature changed over the centuries with plants being grown for pleasure and later being traded for commercial gain. Our relationship with them and the world around us changed dramatically, and how we represented them in books, also changed.

Drawing inspiration from Mughal botanical portraiture from the 1600s, like the image above of Ustad Mansur's work, this book will have an illustrated section printed using wood engravings highlighted by brush strokes by a miniature painter. A reader will accompany this book, detailing the history of the book and the Mughal fascination for gardens and plants.