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A Family of Tartars
c. 1885
- Medium
- Gum tempera, ink, and gold on paper
- Classification
- Painting
- Dimensions
- Overall: 25.3 x 33.8 cm (9 15/16 x 13 5/16 in.)
- Culture
- India, Punjab, probably Lahore, Company School, 19th century
- Museum
- Cleveland Museum of Art, Indian and Southeast Asian Art
- Credit line
- Gift of Maxeen and John Flower in honor of Dr. Stanislaw Czuma
- 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
This painting depicts men of Turkic descent migrating into India from western Asia. No longer with the ambition to conquer, like the Turko-Mongol rulers Timur (d. 1405) and Babur (c. 1530), the first Mughal emperor, these migrants are seeking new lands in which to settle as immigrants. The highly detailed subjects are placed against a plain background, as if the figures were designed for objective study and categorization. Indian artists made works such as this for the British in India, who were interested in collecting accurate visual records of flora, fauna, and ethnic groups who inhabited the land they colonized in 1858.
