Matchbox label - Indian types

European travellers and colonisers brought back sketches and impressions of India, and labels for the Indian export market were based on these. European artists drew highly-oriental images of regal kings and queens, bejewelled courtesans, dancing girls, and singers. Austria, Belgium, Czechoslovakia and Japan exported labels to India as well, for consumption by both Indians and Europeans.

Indian ‘types’ were popular series—depictions of persons of various professions and communities.