The Driedup Lake and Island of the Tomb, Togluckabad

1866

From the collection of Cleveland Museum of Art

Dominant colour

The Driedup Lake and Island of the Tomb, Togluckabad 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

You see a quiet, cracked lakebed with a small island holding a crumbling tomb. The water is gone, leaving only dry earth and shadows. Rousselet drew this while traveling in India, but he wasn’t happy with his sketches. So he learned photography there and used it to record the same places more carefully. This image mixes what he saw with what he later remembered. If you like how light and shadow play here, look up *chiaroscuro*.

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.