Vasant Ragini, part of an illustration from a ragamala series dating to c.1755 and originating from Murshidabad in Bengal, India. Made with opaque pigments with gold on paper, the 9½ x 6in (24 x 15cm) work is priced at $95,000 in Court Painting from India at Oliver Forge and Brendan Lynch.
Among the stand-out folios in the show Court Painting from India is Vasant Ragini, held at the at premises on East 80th Street from March 16-24, is an illustration from a ragamala series dating to c.1755.
Surrounded by 10 young courtly ladies in a garden landscape, this romantic depiction of the nawab, the young ruler of Bengal in eastern India, celebrates the Hindu spring festival of Holi.
Also for sale is a folio taken from the memoirs of Zahīr-ud-Dīn Muhammad Bābur (1483-1530), founder of the Mughal Empire, known as the Baburnama. Depicting Bābur hunting rhinoceros at Bigram near present day Peshawar (Pakistan), the folio comes from the so-called ‘South Kensington’ Baburnama, which was broken up in 1913.
It was the first illustrated manuscript translated into Persian in 1589 and is ascribed to two of the most famous Mughal artists of the period, L’al and Sarwan, who worked on many famous imperial manuscripts.
