BIKANER, NORTH WEST INDIA, CIRCA 1820

Details

MAHARAJA SURAT SINGH OF BIKANER (1787-1828)
BIKANER, NORTH WEST INDIA, CIRCA 1820
Gouache with gold on paper, depicting the portly ruler on a palace terrace, within floral peach borders, with gold rules and wide gray margins comprising large gold flowering plants, a text panel in the upper margin erroneously identifying the ruler as Raja Todar Mal, vizier to the Mughal Emperor Akbar, in black nasta’liq script
Painting: 9 ¼ x 5 ¼ in. (23.5 x 13.5 cm.)
Folio: 15 1/8 x 10 ¼ in. (38.4 x 26.1 cm.)

Provenance

Lucy Truman Aldrich, Providence, Rhode Island.
Acquired from the estate of the above, September 1955.

Literature

R. Ellsworth et al., The David and Peggy Rockefeller Collection: Arts of Asia and Neighboring Cultures, New York, 1993, vol III, p. 297, no. 226.

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Lot Essay

The erroneous inscription reads:
tasvir raja todar mal vazir khazaneh navratan darbar jalaluddin akbar shah badshah - a portrait of Raja Todar Mal, Finance Minister and (one of the) Nine Gems at the court of the Mughal Emperor Akbar

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