Add.Or.2871-2965 Ninety-five scenes from the 'Bhagavata Purana' and other popular...

Add.Or.2871-2965. Ninety-five scenes from the 'Bhagavata Purana' and other popular and religious themes. Khandesh, Mewar style, c.1780. Formerly Albums 72 and 73. Purchased 28 March 1925. Gouache with gold; laid down on card leaves of two volumes and uniformly bound in scoured brown leather with gilt lettering. Page 400 by 290 mm. Note: These two albums bear the bookplate of Sir Henry Evan Murchison James, K.C.I.E. (1846-1923) who was in India from 1865 until his retirement in 1900. He was posted during his career to Bombay, Bengal, Ahmedabad and Sind. The gilt inscription on the covers of the albums reads 'Pictures of Hindoo Mythology from the Fort of Parola Khandesh,' and it can be assumed that James acquired the pictures at Parola (East Khandesh, Bombay). The style of the miniatures is quite uniform, and is almost identical to the style current at Udaipur during the second half of the eighteenth century. Furthermore the pigments used are characteristic of Udaipur painting. Two of the pictures differ in that they are executed in a debased or folk version of the style (Add.Or.2890 and 2912) but the majority are distinguished by their simplification, for in most cases only the bare essentials of each subject have been depicted. The other notable feature is a slight Deccani flavour that is distinguishable in some of the more popular subjects '(eg' Add.Or.2886 and 2894). In the seventeenth century the Udaipur style had been linked with painting at Aurangabad, and the geographical position of Khandesh between Udaipur and Aurangabad could therefore be significant. Thus, although the fact that the pictures were obtained at Parola should not alone be taken as proof of origin, the pictures can be attributed to the presence, perhaps temporarily, of the Udaipur tradition in Khandesh. The illustrations are mostly the more popular scenes from the 'Bhagavata Purana,' telling the story of Krishna and his love-match with Radha. Others are of a devotional nature, depicting Siva and the incarnations of Visnu, while subjects of a more general nature are in the minority.

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