Smithsonian to exhibit world's first visual history of yoga

The Smithsonian in Washington, DC will unveil the world's first-ever exhibit of yoga's visual history, called 'Yoga

The museum's Arthur M. Sackler Gallery will display 120 masterpieces of Indian sculpture and paintings with pieces that date as far back as the third century to the early 20th century, the New York Daily News reported.

Temple sculptures, devotional icons, illustrated manuscripts, as well as colonial and early modern photographs, books, and films aim to shed light on the 2,000-year old practice.

To build the collection, Debra Diamond, curator of South Asian Art, gathered pieces from 25 museums and private collections in India, Europe, and the US.

Highlights include an installation of three monumental stone yogini goddesses from a 10th century Chola temple, ten folios from the first illustrated compilation of asanas made for a Mughal emperor in 1602, and the first film ever produced about India, Thomas Edison's "Hindoo Fakir" (1906).

The show runs from October 19 through January 26.