Painters, Ports, and Profits: Artists and the East India Company, 1750–1850
Published by the Yale Center for British Art
Hardcover, 280 pages, 214 color and black-and-white illus.
ISBN 9780300286540
Editors: Laurel O. Peterson and Holly Shaffer
With contributions by Mark Aronson, Tim Barringer, Swati Chattopadhyay, Soyeon Choi, Anita Dey, Gillian Forrester, Navina Najat Haidar, Richard R. Hark, Emma Hartman, Brooke Krancer, Margaret Masselli, Kaylani Madhura Ramachandran, Romita Ray, Yuthika Sharma, Marcie Wiggins, Winnie Wong, Tom Young
Publication date: January 6, 2026
Description
Painters, Ports, and Profits: Artists and the East India Company, 1750–1850 tells the story of the remarkable creative exchanges that coincided with the rise of one of the most ruthless and powerful corporations in history. Scholarship on this period often separates Indian, Chinese, and British artists; Painters, Ports, and Profits instead foregrounds the vital interactions between their practices. Artistic experimentation with papers, pigments, and other materials produced works of astonishing beauty and variety. Compelled by new subjects and techniques, these artists, many now unknown, had a profound effect on visual and material culture within and beyond Asia.
Edited by curators Laurel O. Peterson and Holly Shaffer, Painters, Ports, and Profits features more than one hundred objects drawn primarily from the Yale Center for British Art’s collection, including architectural drafts, burnished opaque watercolors, hand-colored aquatints, small and large-scale portraits, and a spectacular thirty-seven-foot-long scroll depicting the city of Lucknow. An international group of scholars, curators, and conservators provide rich commentary based on new research.
This publication accompanies the exhibition Painters, Ports, and Profits: Artists and the East India Company, 1750–1850 on view at the Yale Center for British Art from January 8 through June 21, 2026.
Editors Bios:
Laurel O. Peterson is the assistant curator of prints and drawings at the Yale Center for British Art.
Holly Shaffer is Associate Professor in the History of Art Department at Brown University, Rhode Island.
