Kashi Sharma is the sixth generation in his family to specialise in painting haveli frescos. The 30-year-old bachelor learned the trade from his grandfather at the age of 12, and plans to pass the knowledge on to any child of his who's interested, even though he realises it has little practical use in modern-day Rajasthan. 'Haveli painting is a dying art,' says Sharma, who hails from Samob, a village near Jaipur. 'It's a great pity, because the art offers an important depiction of all aspects of village life. Haveli frescos show everything about a community: the people, how they lived, the way they danced and the food they ate. Even the way the maharajah went hunting for tigers. 'But nowadays, most haveli owners have moved into big cities and have little interest in maintaining the frescoes. As a result, there's less work for the artists who are trained in these techniques.' Although Sharma has worked on some spectacular fresco projects on the Samob Palace, the Pushkar Palace and a few luxury hotels, he earns his living selling miniature paintings to tourists. 'My grandfather devoted his whole career to working on havelis, but I have only spent about eight years on them,' he says. 'Within a few years, the haveli style will be dead. People are just not interested in it any more.'