Matthew Thomas
Senior Specialist
Lot 176
An impressive painting on cloth depicting a tiger Rajasthan, probably Udaipur, circa 1900-1920
6 October 2015, 14:00 BST
London, New Bond StreetSold for £17,500 inc. premium
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An impressive painting on cloth depicting a tiger
Rajasthan, probably Udaipur, circa 1900-1920
Rajasthan, probably Udaipur, circa 1900-1920
gouache on cloth, inscriptions in nagari script at upper right and lower centre, backed
186 x 299 cm.
186 x 299 cm.
Footnotes
Provenance
European private collection: acquired from Malcolm Fraser, Olympia, 1993.
Inscriptions: top right, one line in nagari script including '...1933' which could be a Vikram Samvat date; in the centre, number 20 ki:(price) 13
This near life-size painting depicts an animal killed during a hunt. Such a work is an example of the practice of the Mewari nobility of recording their hunting kills, as declarations of their skill and prowess. It is unlikely that such works would have been hung permanently, but rather displayed in triumphant celebration and then stored for posterity. For a rare example of a cloth painting (in a more exaggerated form and style) of a tiger from Mewar, in the collection of Nahar Singh II of Devgarh and attributed to the mid-19th century painter Baijnath, see M. Beach (op. cit, below).
A larger painting depicting a tiger, also from Udaipur, but dated around a century earlier (1765-70) was sold in these rooms, Bonhams, Islamic and Indian Art, 2nd October 2012, lot 174.
For further discussion, see:
Topsfield, Andrew, Court Painting at Udaipur: Art Under the Patronage of the Maharanas of Mewar, Zurich 2001.
Beach, Milo and Rawat Nahar Singh II, Rajasthani Painters: Bagta and Chokha, Master Artists at Devgarh, Zurich 2005, fig. 125.