Prints have become very good. A modern giclee print on canvas can copy the colours of a Pichwai or a Gond painting so closely that, from across a room, you cannot tell the difference. Some sellers add a few strokes of clear gel on top to fake brush texture. Others simply call a print "handmade" because someone, somewhere, stretched the canvas by hand.
None of this matters if you knowingly buy a print for ₹800 because you like the image. It matters a great deal if you pay for an original and receive a reproduction.
The good news is that you do not need to be an expert to tell them apart. You need good light, a magnifier (your phone camera at full zoom works), and about five minutes. Here are eight checks, from the quickest to the most thorough.
1. Tilt it under a light
Hold the painting, or ask the seller to hold it, at an angle to a window or a phone torch. Look across the surface rather than straight at it.
Paint has body. You will see ridges where the brush lifted, slightly raised outlines, places where one colour sits on top of another, and small shiny and matte patches where layers differ. Real gold leaf or metallic paint catches the light and changes as you move.
A print is flat. The whole surface reflects light evenly, like a photograph. Even printed canvas, which has the weave texture of the cloth, shows no paint texture on top of that weave.
This single check catches most prints.
Two Pichwai paintings of the same scene are never identical
2. Zoom in on the edges of a shape
Pick any small detail, an eye, a leaf, a border, and look at it under magnification.
In a hand-painted work the edges of colour are slightly irregular. Paint pools a little where the brush stopped. Fine lines vary in thickness. You may see tiny pigment grains, especially in natural colours.
In a print, colour is built from patterns of tiny dots. Older offset prints show a regular rosette pattern. Inkjet prints show a fine, even spray of dots, often with coloured dots appearing inside what looks like a single solid colour. Once you have seen it, you cannot unsee it.
Hand-drawn outlines on a Pichwai vary slightly in thickness. A printed line never does
3. Look for the artist's mistakes
This sounds odd, but it is one of the best tests. People make small errors. Prints reproduce them, so the test here is a little different: look for signs of process.
In an original you can often find a faint pencil underdrawing that was not fully covered, a line that was corrected and painted over, a dot that is slightly larger than its neighbours, or a border that runs a fraction over its edge. In traditions like Bhil, where thousands of dots are placed by hand, no two dots are exactly alike. In Gond painting, the dashes inside a shape vary slightly in length and spacing.
In a print, these details are frozen and perfectly sharp. If the painting is a copy of a famous work, you can also search the image online. If you find hundreds of identical versions for sale, you have your answer.
Lizard and frogs, a Bhil painting by Lado Bai. Look closely and no two hand-placed dots are the same
4. Turn it over
The back of a painting is honest.
On paper, paint sometimes slightly darkens or buckles the sheet from behind, especially where colour is heavy. Handmade paper has irregular edges and fibres. On cloth, as with Pichwai, Phad or Pattachitra, you can often see where colour has soaked through, and the cloth itself may be stiff from preparation. Rooftop's guide to your first Pichwai explains how a properly prepared Pichwai cloth should feel.
Printed canvas usually has a perfectly clean white back. Printed paper is often uniform machine-made stock, sometimes with a printer's mark or code.
Check the sides too. On stretched canvas, original paintings often have paint wrapping round the edges in an irregular way, or unpainted canvas with drips and marks. Prints on canvas often show the image cleanly stretched round the edges, or a neat white or black border.
A properly prepared Pichwai cloth feels firm in the hand, not soft like printed fabric
5. Watch how the colour behaves
Traditional Indian colours have a look of their own. Natural pigments made from minerals, earth and plants tend to be matte and slightly chalky, and they vary a little in tone across a painted area. Layered colour has depth, because you can sometimes see the lower layer through the upper one at the edges.
Printed colour is consistent from edge to edge. It can look slightly too smooth, or slightly too saturated in places where a painter would have built colour gradually.
Gold is a special giveaway. Printed "gold" is usually a flat ochre or a metallic ink that looks the same from every angle. Real gold leaf or gold paint shifts and glows as you move. Our note on how gold is used in Pichwai covers the different gold finishes and what each one costs.
Gold details shift and glow as you move a real painting under light
6. Beware the "hand-embellished" print
This is the trick that catches careful buyers. A print is made on canvas, and then someone adds a few brushstrokes of clear gel or paint on top, usually on highlights. Under a light, it seems to have texture.
To spot it, combine checks one and two. If the texture appears only in a few places while the rest is flat, and if the colour under the texture shows a dot pattern when you zoom in, it is a print with decoration on top. Some sellers list these honestly as embellished prints. The problem is when they are sold as originals.
7. Check that the surface matches the tradition
Every traditional art form has a surface it belongs on, and a printed copy usually ignores it.
| Art form | Traditional surface | What to look for |
|---|---|---|
| Pichwai | Prepared cotton cloth | Stiff, burnished cloth, colour soaked in |
| Phad | Starched, polished cloth | Slight sheen, natural colours |
| Warli | Cow dung ground or Majarpat | Earthy, uneven brown base you can feel |
| Madhubani | Handmade paper or cloth | Irregular fibres and edges |
| Miniature | Wasli, burnished layered paper | Smooth but slightly irregular, very fine brushwork |
| Gond and Bhil | Paper or canvas | Raised paint in the dots and dashes |
A "Warli painting" printed on glossy photo paper, or a "Pichwai" on thin polyester, is a clue. Modern artists do paint on new surfaces, and that is fine, but the surface should make sense for the work and the seller should be able to explain it.
The Warli Tree of Life by Pravin Mhase. White pigment on an earthy, uneven ground is what Warli should look like
8. Ask the seller the right questions
The last check is the paperwork and the person.
A genuine original should come with:
- The artist's name, not just "handmade" or "traditional artisans".
- The medium and surface, for example "natural pigments on cloth" or "acrylic on canvas".
- The size, and ideally when it was made.
- A certificate of authenticity from a seller who can stand behind it.
Ask for extra photos in daylight, including a close-up of the surface and a photo of the back. Ask whether you can see the work in progress. Artists who paint by hand usually have photos of the process, and good sellers are happy to share them.
Then look at the price. A detailed 3-foot hand-painted Pichwai cannot cost the same as a cushion cover. If the price seems impossible for the work involved, it almost certainly is.
How Rooftop handles this
Every painting on Rooftop is hand-painted by a verified artist, named on the listing, and comes with a certificate of authenticity. Listings give the medium, surface and size, and each one has an enquiry button so you can ask for more photos or details before you buy. The artist earns a royalty on every sale.
If you want to browse with confidence, start with Rooftop's original paintings, or go by tradition: Pichwai, Gond, Bhil, Warli or Madhubani.
The fastest way to train your eye
There is one more way to get good at this, and it is the most enjoyable. Learn to paint the tradition yourself.
Once you have spent an evening placing Bhil dots by hand or building a Pichwai in layers, you never mistake a print for a painting again. You know what a hand-placed dot looks like because you have made five hundred of them. Rooftop's Indian art courses are taught by the master artists themselves, and our guide to learning traditional Indian art online helps you choose one.
Quick checklist
Save this for the next time you shop:
- Tilt it under light. Is there paint texture?
- Zoom in. Do you see brush edges or a dot pattern?
- Look for signs of process: underdrawing, corrections, uneven dots.
- Turn it over. Does the back look painted on or printed on?
- Watch the colour, especially gold.
- Is the texture everywhere, or only in a few spots?
- Does the surface suit the tradition?
- Is there an artist's name, a certificate and a believable price?
Frequently asked questions
How can I tell if a painting is original or a print?
Tilt it under light to look for paint texture, then zoom in with your phone camera. A print shows a pattern of tiny dots and a flat surface. An original shows brush edges, layered colour and small irregularities.
What is a giclee print?
A giclee is a high-quality inkjet print, often on canvas or fine paper. It can look very close to an original but has no paint texture and shows a fine dot pattern under magnification.
Does a certificate of authenticity guarantee a painting is original?
Only if it comes from a credible seller who can link the work to a named artist. Always check the painting itself as well as the paperwork.
Are Rooftop paintings original?
Yes. Every painting on Rooftop is hand-painted by a verified artist and comes with a certificate of authenticity.
