AN ILLUSTRATION FROM A RAGAMALA SERIES: KRISHNA WITH RADHA AND GOPIS ON A TERRACE
INDIA, RAJASTHAN, JAIPUR, CIRCA 1810
Estimate: £15,000 - £20,000
Auction: 11 June 2025 from 10:00 BST
Description
gouache on paper heightened with gold, mounted on an album page with a striking Mughal-style floral decorated yellow border and two further inner margins, depicting Krishna and Radha on a terrace close to a pavilion, both pointing out to the looming storm above, two gopis behind them holding morchals and looking at one another quizzically, a gopi in front of the couple also pointing out to the sky, in the background, a pair of peacocks perched calmly on the blue and gold balustrade looking towards the sky, two pairs of birds are nestled in the trees beyond, in the bottom part of the painting illustrates an elaborate palace basement, mounted, glazed and framed
Dimensions
39.8cm x 29.4cm
Footnote
This is a brilliantly painted and captivating image centred around the looming storm but equally symbolic in the smaller details, such as the paired birds nestled in the trees, no doubt representing Krishna's undying love. The bright colour palette is typical of Jaipur. The painting is organised with an elaborate basement storey. The artist suggests real depth as we can see well inside the entrance at its centre and into the corner of the angled pavilion on the upper terrace. The edge of the terrace projects over the lower storey, cantilevered by means of a row of supporting brackets.
Robert Del Bonta has suggested that this un-inscribed album leaf may represent Madhumadhavi ragini from a Ragamala series. The way the figures point to the lightning is characteristic to the usual depictions of this ragini. Peacocks are also a normal feature of Madhumadhavi, though they are often shown fluttering or crying in excitement as the storm gathers while flocks of other birds such as Sarus cranes take flight into the darkening sky (see K. Ebeling, Ragamala Painting, 1972, p. 69 for a Madhumadhavi ragini dated 1756 from the small principality of Malpura, south of Jaipur, in which a lady rushes into the palace to escape the onset of the thunderstorm; and p. 71 for an eighteenth century Jaipur depiction with excited, squawking peacocks that need feeding before the storm erupts). In the present picture, the peacocks simultaneously function as symbols of Krishna, reinforcing the iconography of his peacock feather crown and the morchals held by the gopis.