We briefed the snake charmer as a classical Kalighat genre figure rather than a satire — the 19th-century patuas painted Calcutta's street performers with the same affectionate brush they gave the gods, and the been-player is one of the most graphic. The whole composition is a single curve running from the crouched body through the brick-red gourd been to the swelling cobra hood that rises from the wicker basket, so the player and the snake read as two ends of one line. He crouches in profile in a slate-blue turban and dhoti, a red-and-white striped gamcha over one shoulder, bare-chested and intent, the gourd pressed to his lips. We let the cobra's grey hood and the brown basket carry the lower corner and kept the rest of the ground plain, so the duet of breath and answer is the entire picture. No crowd, no street, no clutter — just the player, the been and the cobra.