A Zenana Scene

Details

Thomas Daniell, R.A. (1769-1837)
A Zenana Scene
oil on canvas
18½ x 14 in. (47 x 35.6 cm.)

Provenance

with Arthur Ackermann, London.
with Spink, London, March, 1972, where purchased for the present collection.

Literature

M. Shellim, Oil Paintings of India and the East by Thomas Daniell, R.A. (1749-1840) and William Daniell, R.A. (1769-1837), London 1979, p.65, pl.TD58, illustrated.

Exhibited

Possibly British Institution, 1830, no.77.
India Observed, no. 16.

Special notice

No VAT will be charged on the hammer price, but VAT at 17.5% will be added to the buyer's premium which is invoiced on a VAT inclusive basis

Lot Essay

The zenana quarters (a name derived form the Persian word zan, a woman) were the apartments of a house in which the women lived in purdah. They excited the curiosity of the Europeans who were of course rigidly excluded from them. The scene in this picture is therefore imaginary for it was most unlikely that the Daniells could have been presented to a Muslim lady of rank as she would have been secluded in purdah, but the properties and the architecture were probably based on drawings of the palaces made at Lucknow in 1789. The picture is similar in style and size to two painted in 1804 for Sir Richard Colt Hoare of Stourhead, Wiltshire showing Muslim and Hindu types. Like them this painting was probably intended to illustrate the manners and customs of India.

For a note on the artist please see lot 4.

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