1. Some of the maharajas, like the one at Kapurthala, had exquisite taste
A. In 1902, the Maharaja of Kapurthala gave his civil engineer photographs of the Versailles palace and asked him to replicate it, right down to the gargoyles.
B. Yeshwantrao Holkar of Indore brought in Bauhaus aesthetics and even works of modem artists hke Brancusi and Duchamp.
C. Kitsch is the most polite way to describe them.
D. But many of them, as the available-light photographs show, had execrable taste.
6. Like Ali Baba's caves, some of the palaces were like warehouses with the downright ugly next to the sublimely aesthetic.