Maharaja Shri Anand Singh-ji and His Consort
1729
unspecified
From the collection of Cleveland Museum of Art
1729
unspecified
From the collection of Cleveland Museum of Art
Maharaja Shri Anand Singh-ji and His Consort is a 1729 unspecified by Ustad Murad, a Baroque work, held at Cleveland Museum of Art.
A king and queen sit close on a flowered carpet, wine spilling from a bottle. The king’s arm rests on her shoulder. Behind them, a huge blue-and-gold cushion fills the space, shutting out everyone else. The artist used real gold and silver paint to show the shine of silk and jewels. Tiny patterns in the corners—blue and white swirls—hint that the court traded with faraway places. The queen’s relaxed pose and the spilled wine feel like a private moment, not a stiff royal portrait. Look up other paintings of the rajput kingdom of bikaner to see more royal scenes like this.
The artist used metallic paint to indicate the sumptuous materials of the carpet covered with roses that marks the place of the royal couple. The king affectionately slings one arm around the shoulders of his queen, who carelessly allows wine to flow out of the bottle. A gigantic indigo-and-gold cushion provides their backdrop, excluding their attendant. The blue and white arabesques in the spandrels—triangular spaces above the arch—point to the couple’s international sophistication; the elite in northwestern India imported blue-and-white Dutch tiles and Chinese porcelain.
The silver carpet marks the royal window where subjects can come to see him.
Read the full account in the museum source.
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