
Dora Tan
Head of Sale, Specialist
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Head of Sale, Specialist

International Director
This painting's Marwari inscription describes the young maiden's depth of loneliness as she laments with her confidant (sakhi) over her lost love. This classic refrain exploring the state of destitution when being separated from divinity could be from any one of the Krishna-lila poems that were reproduced with illustrations for the royal Mewar library in the mid-17th century. However, with both protagonist and confidant each taking in a flower, the painting quite possibly belongs to Canto 3 of the Gita Govinda, in which a flower's fragrance reminds Radha of Krishna's scent, exacerbating her longing, while her sakhi sympathizes, explaining that howsoever pleasant the impassioning spring season may be when lovers meet, it is equally distressing during separation. More specifically, the painting may refer to verse 31, correlating with the inscribed number in the bottom right corner, in which Radha's sakhi remarks on how the saffron nagakesar flower resembles the God of Love's (Kamadeva) wand and others his quiver.
The work is painted in the style of Manohar, who succeeded Sahabdin as the master of the Mewar atelier and oversaw the production of several Krishna-lila poems, including the Rasikapriya, Kavi-priya, and Gita Govinda. A closely related page from a Gita Govinda series in the style of Manohar is in The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (1985.398.12). Compare the eyes and garments of the kneeling ladies near the bottom center of each painting. The folios are also the same size and have a narrow orange-red border, which in the present example has been extended by mounting a second, deeper red border. For further related works, see Topsfield, Court Painting at Udaipur, 2001, pp.53-84 (also figs.37 & 38) and Williams, Kingdom of the Sun, 2007, no.6. Also compare Christie's, New York, 20 March 2019, lot 721.
Provenance:
Private European Collection
Private Virginia Collection, acquired from the above in the late 1990s