Window mode follows your eyes with your camera, in this browser only: no picture or position leaves your device.
Portrait of Sardar Singh (Son of Savant Singh, 1730–68)
c. 1760
- Medium
- Gum tempera and gold on paper
- Classification
- Painting
- Dimensions
- Image: 27.9 x 21.9 cm (11 x 8 5/8 in.); Overall: 34.6 x 26.6 cm (13 5/8 x 10 1/2 in.)
- Culture
- Northwestern India, Rajasthan, Kishangarh
- Museum
- Cleveland Museum of Art, Indian and Southeast Asian Art
- Credit line
- Edwin R. and Harriet Pelton Perkins Memorial Fund
- Rights
- Public domain (CC0), as the museum states it.
- Who can see it
- Tweens profiles and older: its subjects are known and suit older children. How works are placed
View at the Cleveland Museum of Art
About this work
The ruler of the princely state of Kishangarh chose to have himself depicted in an intoxicatingly paradisiacal setting. He and his queen occupy jeweled chairs on a white marble terrace with formal flower gardens overlooking a lake. They listen to a musical performance while female attendants stand ready to whisk away flies and serve tiny bottles liquor. The fresh palette and dramatically elongated eyes, especially on the women, are hallmarks of the most celebrated works from this Rajput court. The king is portrayed with less exaggerated features than the women, which makes him seem more human, despite the halo that sets off his face and elaborate turban.
