Chapter 10The Changing World of Visual Arts New Forms of Imperial Art Looking for the picturesque Picturesque landscape painting was a popular imperial tradition. Thisstyle of painting portrayed India as an old-fashioned land to beexplored by travelling British artists. Its landscape was rugged and wild, seemingly untamed by humanhands. Thomas Daniell and his nephew William Daniell were the mostfamous artists of this tradition. Portraits of authority The rich and the powerful, both the British and the Indian, wanted tosee themselves on canvas. Unlike the Indian tradition of painting portraits in miniature, colonialportraits were life-size images and looked real. The new style of making portraits served as a means of displaying thelavish lifestyles, wealth and status that the British Empire generated. Painting history This traditional art sought to dramatise and recreate various episodesof British imperial history and enjoyed great prestige and popularityduring the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. For the history painters in Britain, the British victories in India servedas rich material. These paintings served as a favourable image ofBritish actions in India. These paintings celebrated the power, the victories and thesupremacy of the British in India.