Jallandharnath and Princess Padmini Fly over King Padam's Palace, 1830, Opaque watercolor on paper, Amardas Bhatti, 29 x 37", Mehrangarh Museum Trust, RJS 1644.
Maharaja Bakhat Singh Rejoices during Holi, ca. 1748-50, Opaque watercolor on paper, Attributed to Nagaur, India, 29 x 37", Mehrangarh Museum Trust, RJS, 1986.
Maharaja Bakhat Singh and Zenana Women Savor the Moonlight Evening, ca. 1735, Opaque watercolor on paper, Attributed to Nagaur, India, 29 x 37", Mehrangarh Museum Trust, RJS 1987.
Map of India
Map of Jodhpur region
Maharaja Bakhat Singh at the Jharokha Window of the Bakhat Mahal, ca. 1735, Opaque watercolor on paper, Attributed to Nagaur, India 1737 (Samvat 1794), 37 x 29", Mehrangarh Museum Trust, RJS 2031. |
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Seattle Art Museum
1300 1st Avenue
206-654-3100
Seattle
Seattle Asian Art Museum,
South Galleries
Garden and Cosmos:
The Royal Paintings of Jodhpur
January 29-April 26, 2009
Marwar-Jodhpur, the largest former Rajput kingdoms (in the modern state of Rajasthan), was ruled by the Rathore Rajputs, a princely caste of warriors who became great patrons of art in the 17th to19th centuries. Produced for the private enjoyment of the Marwar-Jodhpur maharajas, virtually none of the 60 works on view in "Garden and Cosmos" have ever been published or seen by scholars since their creation centuries ago. Innovative in their large scale, subject matter, and styles, they reveal the conceptual sophistication of the royal atelier and the kingdom's engagement with the changing political landscapes of early modern India.
Marwar-Jodhpur court painters' atelier developed two major aesthetic sensibilities that have been previously unrecognized. The dominant theme of 18th-century painting was the garden, an idyllic landscape enjoyed by rulers and gods alike. In the 19th century, artists focused on evoking otherworldly spaces of a sublime and awe-inspiring cosmos.
The bold inventiveness of Marwar-Jodhpur artists is revealed through their creation of "monumental manuscripts." Thirty-three monumental folios, each a full-page painting approximately four feet in width, are featured in the exhibition. Like most north Indian court paintings, they are glowing and finely detailed opaque watercolors on paper, but their scale dramatically overturns typical expectations of Indian painting as a "miniature" art.
Garden and Cosmos is divided into thematic sections devoted to the garden and cosmos themes, with an introductory gallery about the kingdom of Marwar-Jodhpur and the origins of its court painting traditions in the 17th century.
The Garden in the Desert
The exhibition opens with a splendid embroidered tent canopy from the Marwar ancestral collection. Exuberantly adorned on its interior with silk-embroidered blossoms on scrolling vines, the canopy recreates the virtual gardens that the maharajas enjoyed when they made camp in remote areas of desert kingdoms while on military campaigns or religious pilgrimages. The floral pattern, which recurs on paintings throughout the "Garden" galleries, epitomizes the Marwar aesthetic of the garden.
Origins of Jodhpur Court Painting
Between the 13th and the 17th centuries, Rathore clan leaders transformed from regional rulers into cosmopolitan maharajas, or great kings. Five 17th-century paintings track this transformation by revealing how the atelier brought together a local, spontaneous style and the sophisticated court style of the Mughal Empire (1526-1857) to create a uniquely Marwar-Jodhpur idiom. Small in size, these royal portraits and musical theme (ragamala) paintings allow the viewer to fully appreciate the innovative directions taken by the atelier in the following centuries.
Gardens for Royal Pleasure:
Maharaja Bakhat Singh
A recently rediscovered cache of paintings reveal the aesthetic of the garden emerged under Maharaja Bakhat Singh (1725-51) at Ahhichatragarh Fort in Nagaur on the northern border of Marwar. Bakhat Singh was an exemplary ruler, but his reputation was permanently stained when he murdered his father in order to gain the throne of Nagaur. At Nagaur, Bakhat Singh transformed the arid region into a garden by rebuilding palaces and creating a sophisticated water system. Eleven paintings depict the architectural setting and express Bakhat Singh's sensuous delight in the opulent garden-palaces. Many paintings also depict musical performances. Visitors to this gallery can experience similar Marwar court compositions, which will be played continuously for the duration of the exhibition.
Gardens for Divine Play:
Maharaja Vijai Singh
Maharaja Vijai Singh, the son of Bakhat Singh, ruled Marwar for 41 years (1752-93). Vijai Singh's atelier created the "monumental manuscript" genre for sacred texts relating the exploits of Krishna, Rama and the great Goddess. While Vijai Singh's court artists continued to depict gardens and palaces in the rich pastel colors employed at Nagaur in Bakhat Singh's reign (1725-51), their grand vision expanded and transformed the earthly court into expansive sacred landscapes that charm and delight with narrative verve and compositional ingenuity.
Kingdom and Cosmos:
Maharaja Man Singh
The grandson of Vijai Singh, Man Singh credited his near-miraculous recovery to an immortal practitioner of hatha yoga (mahasiddha) who was worshipped by Nath Sampradaya, the religious tradition that revealed hatha yoga in the 12th or 13th century. Man Singh patronized more than 1,000 paintings expressing the sacred power of the Nath mahasiddhas and their metaphysics. Monumental paintings in this section represent profound subjects tackled by Indian court painters with visionary intensity. Subjects include the origins of the cosmos and the immaterial essence of being Brahman, as well as shimmering chakras (energy centers), mandalas (cosmic maps) and asanas (yoga postures).
More than 50 of the works presented in Garden and Cosmos were lent by His Highness Gaj Singh II, the Maharaja of Marwar-Jodhpur, India, from the Mehrangarh Museum Trust. The 36th Maharaja of the Rathore clan of Jodhpur, he is a recipient of the renowned Hadrian award from the World Monuments Fund for his work on cultural and architectural preservation in Rajasthan and currently serves on the Governing Council of the Indian National Trust for Art and Cultural Heritage. Selected paintings are also on loan from the National Museum of India and European, American, and Australian museums.
Debra Diamond, associate curator of South and Southeast Asian art at the Freer and Sackler galleries in Washington, D.C., is the exhibition curator. The curatorial team also includes Karni Singh Jasol, curator of the Mehrangarh Fort Museum in Jodhpur, India, and Catherine Glynn, an independent scholar of Rajput painting.
Accompanying the exhibition is a 352-page, fully illustrated catalog containing more than 100 colorful images and individual essays by noted scholars assessing new and recent discoveries of each work presented in Garden and Cosmos. An audio guide produced by Narrowcasters, which features narration by the exhibition curator and the current Maharaja of Marwar-Jodhpur, along with music and poetry readings that relate to the paintings, accompanies the exhibition.
Chakras of the Subtle Body, 1823, Opaque watercolor and gold on paper, Attributed to Bulaki (Samvat 1880), 61 x 32-1/2", Mehrangarh Museum Trust, RJS 2427. |
