SHIVA AND DAYAL. Maharana Jagat Singh Hawks for Cranes

SHIVA AND DAYAL

Maharana Jagat Singh Hawks for Cranes

Maharana Jagat Singh Hawks for Cranes. Artist: Shiva and Dayal. Culture: Western India, Rajasthan, Udaipur. Dimensions: Sheet: 26 7/8 x 29 3/4 in. (68.3 x 75.6 cm) Image: 23 7/8 x 25 7/8 in. (60.6 x 65.7 cm) Framed: 34 5/8 × 36 1/2 × 1 1/2 in. (87.9 × 92.7 × 3.8 cm). Date: dated 1744. This spectacular panoramic vista of the Mewar landscape depicts a royal hunting party in a series of consecutive vignettes, creating a continuous narrative. The aerial perspective, reflecting the plunging views of terrain offered from many Rajput forts, was an innovation of the Mewar school, perhaps combined here with a new awareness of European cartography. The rays of golden sun--the insignia that Rajput princes displayed on their standards--add a surreal if somewhat celestial dimension to the composition. This painting is remarkable for its complex topography, differentiated with imaginatively devised pictorial devices--hillocks, streams, fields--each deployed to create a landscape of the imagination. The large scale of the work is typical of mid-eighteenth-century Mewar painting, as is the likelihood that multiple artists worked on it in a palace studio environment.

Opaque watercolor, ink and gold on paper

Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, USA

Album / Metropolitan Museum of Art, NY

Model: No - Property: No
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3970 x 3690 px | 41.9 MB

33.6 x 31.2 cm | 13.2 x 12.3 in (300 dpi)