Is there a particular name for this style of Indian(?) art? I’ve seen it most often when depicting scenes from Buddha’s life.
I dunno, but it looks a whole lot like the “art” I’ve seen in Hare Krishna literature. Definitely no earlier than the 20th Century.
It looks less like traditional Buddhist Sub continental art and more like art I have seen representing Hindu gods and goddesses. It also has a strange S Indian feel to it.
I’d call it the “huge ears and broken ankles” style.
Kitsch? 
I’ve seen pictures in this style in the past and I thought it was kind of dumb. But I’ve been reading about meditation and Buddhism lately and I’ve seen several pictures like this and for some reason I find myself drawn to it now. Of course, now I can’t find the examples of it that I saw before.
It has this weird, almost cartoony, kitschy but also deeply meaningful vibe to it that I can’t explain.
Going to give myself one bump.
This style of art is found all over India (and Hare Krsna books.) I think it would take an Indian art historian to figure this out.
In that way, a lot like Bollywood musicals.
My first thought was “black velvet” though it doesn’t look like velvet.
My second thought was the Asian Thomas Kinkade.
Noooo! Don’t say it. I love this style of art. My avatar is by a painter named Augustin Kassi. I think he paints in this style. Some people call the style “Boterismo” after the artist Fernando Botero.
At least, it looks in that style to me. I don’t know where it really originates and I have no training in Art. So I could be wrong. But I love that linked painting.
It’s just a generic western-traditional-influenced global modern ‘realist’ style, a lot like what you’re find in the New Testament that aunt Jean got you for your 10th birthday. It’s not super traditional/ any pre-20th-century style in particular.
It’s like when a decent musician earnestly covers a terrible pop song. They strip away all the crap commercial production, they slow down the tempo and they play it with just an acoustic guitar. Then you discover that the lyrics aren’t too bad and there was some genuine emotion underneath the gloss. So then, when you listen to the original you can dive right past all shittiness and get to the heart of it. And now you’re moved by a terrible pop song.
I know that the linked image is cheesy but after immersing myself in Buddhism (one biography of Buddha and one book about meditation) I’ve been really moved some of the images that I saw.
The Buddhist art style that can be named is not the true Buddhist art style.
Ugh. I have that same feeling I got when I realized American cheese isn’t considered good food.
Water color on canvas.
Not just Buddhist art–I’ve found that this seems to be the go-to decor for Indian buffets, which tend to focus more on Krishna and the other Hindu deities (hi, Ganesh! Isn’t he everybody’s favorite?) than Buddhist themes.
Raja Ravi Varma was the Victorian-era painter who invented this style. He has been massively popular and influential in Indian graphic arts ever since. So much of modern Hinduism’s self-imaging has taken after RRV. In the 1970s this style of art started to get more jazzed up when brilliant acrylic colors and airbrushes became widely available, and it’s still going. RRV invented his style as a fusion of imagery from traditional Indian art with the technical approach of the Academic school of 19th-century European art. The Academic school itself originated as an attempt to fuse the controlled lines of Neoclassical (e.g. Ingres, David) and the color of Romantic (e.g. Delacroix) styles.
I don’t know if the style officially has a name. If I were to give it a name, it would be Indian Late Academic, or maybe in Spanish el ravivarmismo.
Thanks everyone! You’ve been really helpful. I googled both “Indian deity paintings” and “Hindu deity paintings” and found some of what I was looking for. It’s a good place to start. Thanks especially to Nzinga, Seated and Johanna for giving me two new artists to look at.