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Basohli artists seem to have carried the style to other states to Guler, Jammu, Chamba, Kulu, Nurpur and Bilaspur but it is not until 1770 that the Krishna theme again comes into prominence.
In about this year, artists from Guler migrated to the distant Garhwal, a large and straggling state at the far south of the Punjab Hills, taking with them a style of exquisite naturalism which had gradually reached maturity under the Guler ruler, Raja Govardhan Singh.
The great Alaknanda River which roared through Srinagar, the capital, had a special fascination for him and just as Leonardo da Vinci evinced at one time a passionate interest in springing curls, the Guler artist found a special excitement in winding eddies and dashing water. The result was a sudden new interpretation of the Krishna theme.
In two pictures where Krishna is shown quelling the snake Kaliya, all the Guler qualities of elegant naturalism are abundantly present. Each figure has a smooth suavity and in every face there appears a look of calm adoration. It is the swirling, curling water, however, which gives the pictures their special Garhwal quality.
Among the Guler painters was a master-artist and although his first Garhwal pictures are concerned with passionate romance, devotion to Krishna quickly becomes apparent.
It is unlikely that artists were immediately summoned, but certainly by 1780 a flourishing school of painters had come into existence. As at Garhwal, the artists of Kangra came originally from Guler and thus a similar phenomenon arises the Guler manner providing the basis for yet a second great style.
We do not know which member of the Garhwal court acted as his patron it is even possible that it was not the ruler himself but his consort, the Guler princess whom he had married in about the year 1770.
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