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Nanda and the elders, page from a Bhagavata Purana

c. 1525–40

Medium: Gum tempera and ink on paper
Classification: Painting
Dimensions: Overall: 16.3 x 21.5 cm (6 7/16 x 8 7/16 in.)
Culture: Northern India
Museum: Cleveland Museum of Art, Indian and Southeast Asian Art
Credit line: Mr. and Mrs. William H. Marlatt Fund
Rights: Public domain (CC0), as the museum states it.
Who can see it: Teens profiles and older: its museum says too little about what it shows to place it for younger viewers. How works are placed

About this work

In a page from a manuscript about the life of the Hindu god Krishna, Krishna’s foster father, wearing green, confers about moving their community to a new location. Their current village has been beset by demons sent by the evil king to kill Krishna.

Typical of South Asian compositions of the early 1500s, figures and other elements are arranged in horizontal rows. Above, in the story of an encounter between a gardener and a merchant’s daughter who wants a rose, we see use of the same Mughal convention, shown with a more natural conceptualization of space. Mughal compositions were often based on earlier illustrations.