# A Night Scene of Shiva Puja (recto)

- By: Muhammad Rizavi Hindi (Indian, active mid-1700s)
- Date: c. 1760–70
- Medium: Gum tempera and gold on paper
- Classification: Painting
- Dimensions: Painting only: 14.5 x 11.1 cm (5 11/16 x 4 3/8 in.); Page: 28.2 x 24.1 cm (11 1/8 x 9 1/2 in.)
- Culture: Mughal India, Lucknow
- Credit line: Gift in honor of Madeline Neves Clapp; Gift of Mrs. Henry White Cannon by exchange; Bequest of Louise T. Cooper; Leonard C. Hanna Jr. Fund; From the Catherine and Ralph Benkaim Collection
- Museum: [Cleveland Museum of Art](https://clevelandart.org/art/2013.350.a)
- Rights: [Public domain (CC0)](https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/)
- Picture: https://invisiblenetwork.ai/thumbs/cma/2013.350.a/2013.350.a_web.jpg
- Who can see it: Tweens profiles and older (museums give no ratings; placed by Invisible Network from the museum's own words)

Under golden stars and a crescent moon, a royal woman offers a flower garland at an open-air shrine to the Hindu god Shiva. Installed on a platform under a sapling, the stone linga believed to contain Shiva’s presence bears the bright orange traces of devotional anointments. Orange kumkum (red turmeric powder) and yellow saffron are in tiny trays before her, and she has used them to mark her forehead with the signs of her piety. The small brass ewer would contain purified water to bathe the linga. On the platform are offerings of fragrant blossoms and the light of clarified butter lamps.