Painted Prayers
Introduction

Introduction:
At some point in each year, the women of almost every Indian household create decorative designs on their walls or floors. Their purposes are varied: to cleanse, to beautify, to honor, to bring good luck, to prevent evil, or to pray for a specific wish. Most often their intention is spiritual, a ritual invocation to the gods. Each region and group of communities has a unique artistic style and each household its own creative innovations. When considering India as a whole, the breadth of this art is inconceivable. This gallery, chosen from thousands of photographs of these ‘painted prayers’ taken by Huyler during his years of travel in India, is representative of only a small fraction of this remarkable creative diversity. Many of them have never been published or seen by the public before.