Alongside numerous photographs of Delhi and the three durbars, the exhibitions includes many other objects relating to them, from medals, souvenirs, postcards, official durbar directories, admittance tickets and book

Two eminent city historians, Swapna Liddle and Rana Safvi, combed through DAG’s archival collection of photographs, books and documents relating to the city’s history over the past two centuries to curate DAG’s first exhibition drawn from its archives focusing on the three Durbars of 1877, 1903, and 1911. With an abundance of material relating to the three Coronation Durbars that the British held in the city in the late colonial era, along with related material that shows how the pageantry and imagery of the Durbar drew on the city’s rich cultural and architectural heritage, DAG is proud to present Delhi Durbar: Empire, Display and the Possession of History—an exhibition that traces the trajectory of Delhi within the British imperial imagination, from the aftermath of the Revolt of 1857 to the proclamation of New Delhi in 1911.

While the historians in the past have analysed the ideology of the Delhi durbars, never-before has such a collection of the material culture of these events been brought together for display, even though, the British Delhi Durbars have been the subject of much recent scholarly study and re-evaluation. Heavily drawing the visual imagery of the durbars on the heritage of the city: on Mughal courtly ceremonies of the past—as the very name ‘durbar’ indicates—as well as the stately architecture of the Mughal and sultanate periods, the objects in this exhibition bring them materially present, through works by some of the leading artists and photographers of the period. Delhi had also, of course, been the scene of some of the bloodiest conflict during the Uprising of 1857, and the first of the durbars was held in Delhi just twenty years later, partly as a gesture of reconciliation and healing. Beginning with a ‘darshan’ of the great monuments of the city, as seen in paintings, photographs and postcards of the time, the exhibition then moves to images of Delhi in 1857, before proceeding to the three imperial durbars in turn.