Colonnades of Pirthi Raj, Interior View, Delhi

1866

From the collection of Cleveland Museum of Art

Dominant colour

Colonnades of Pirthi Raj, Interior View, Delhi is a 1866 by Louis-Théophile Marie Rousselet, a Impressionism work, held at Cleveland Museum of Art.

Who painted this?: Louis-Théophile Marie Rousselet
When & what style?: 1866 · Impressionism
Where can I see it?: Cleveland Museum of Art

About this work

Sunlight streams through tall stone arches, casting long shadows across a quiet courtyard in Delhi. The arches curve like ribs, holding up the sky. Rousselet made this drawing while traveling in India in the 1860s. He worried his sketches weren’t doing the place justice, so he taught himself photography there—no easy feat back then. This image is one of many he later turned into prints, showing India’s grand old buildings before cameras were common. If you like this quiet, sunlit scene, look up *chiaroscuro*—the way artists use light and dark to shape a space.

The story of this work

Overview

Concerned that his drawings did not do justice to the splendor of India’s monuments, Rousselet learned photography in India that year, a remarkable accomplishment. He proved to be a talented photographer with a sophisticated sense of composition. The scenes in this volume sweep across sites of Sultanate, Rajput, and Mughal power in northern India, from the sacred Hindu city of Varanasi on the Ganges River to Alwar in Rajasthan. Also included are several scenes of industry and portraits of Indian rulers.