1882
oil
From the collection of Victoria and Albert Museum
Copy of painting inside the Ajanta caves (cave 2) is a 1882 oil by John Griffiths, a Impressionism work, depicting Buddhism, held at Victoria and Albert Museum.
This oil painting copies a 2,000-year-old Buddhist mural from Ajanta Cave 2. It shows scenes from the Buddha’s past lives called Jatakas. Griffiths and his students spent winters at Ajanta for over a decade to make these copies. A fire destroyed earlier efforts, so this work helped save fragile art. Check out the Victoria and Albert Museum to see more Ajanta copies.
This is a copy of a mural from Cave 2 at Ajanta, part of a series produced between 1872 and 1885 by John Griffiths and seven Indian students from the Bombay School of Art. The original paintings, dating from the 1st century BC to around AD 480, depict narratives from the Buddha’s life, known as the Jatakas. The copy reproduces a scene positioned above the entrance to Cave 17, featuring identifiable figures including past Buddhas, the historical Buddha Shakyamuni, and the future Buddha Maitreya, some distinguished by the trees beneath which they sit.
Read the full account in the museum source.
John Griffiths (29 November 1837 – 1 December 1918) was a Welsh artist who worked in India, noted for his Orientalist works.
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