Bhairava Raga
1591
paint
From the collection of Victoria and Albert Museum
1591
paint
From the collection of Victoria and Albert Museum
Bhairava Raga is a 1591 paint by Unknown, a Mughal Painting work, held at Victoria and Albert Museum.
This painting shows Shiva and Parvati in a palace. Shiva, the blue-skinned destroyer god, sits stiff and fierce. Parvati, his calm wife, kneels beside him. Their rich robes and jewelry fill the small picture with color. Paintings like this pair music with art. Each one matches a raga—a Hindu melody—with a scene or mood. This set once had a colophon, a written note at the end, but it’s now lost. Look up the Victoria and Albert Museum to see more ragamala art.
This painting from a dispersed ragamala set depicts Bhairava raga, showing the Hindu god Shiva in his fierce form, Bhairava, seated with his consort Parvati in a palace setting. Executed in opaque watercolor and gold on paper by three artists trained under Mir Sayyid 'Ali, the work blends Hindu iconography with Mughal artistic conventions. The set’s colophon, dated 1591 (999 AH) at Chunar near Varanasi, identifies the artists as pupils of Mir Sayyid 'Ali, a prominent painter at Emperor Akbar’s court. The composition includes Shiva holding a vina beneath an elephant-hide canopy, reflecting the…
Read the full account in the museum source.
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