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拍品專文
This formal jharoka portrait depicts Maharana Bhim Singh of Mewar (1778-1828) as assured, confident and powerful, dressed in rich fabrics and a draped in jewellery that is given tangible volume through the use of thick impasto. The portrait’s impressive physical size contributes to its grandeur. The painting successfully masks the reality that although Bhim Singh retained some pride, he was generally amiable and ineffectual as a ruler. His reign was full of humiliations and his court was for the most part near-destitute (Andrew Topsfield, Court Painting at Udaipur, Zurich, 2001, p.215). Nonetheless, Bhim Singh reversed the trend of court painting in Mewar which had almost ceased to exist in the late 18th century through his patronage of the painter Bagta and, more importantly, his son Chokha.
This present portrait is typical of Chokha’s blossoming independent style in Udaipur following his father’s return to the court at Devgarh. Chokha’s figures are stocky and thickset, the men with strong necks and hirsute (ibid, p.221). However, unlike earlier more rigid court portraiture Chokha has been noted for his great ability at imbuing expression and rasa (sentiment) into his work. He excelled at expressing sringara rasa (erotic sentiment) through the large and languid eyes of his portraits and his figures often appearing curvaceous and sensual. Molly Aitken notes how sringara rasa is expressed in the portraiture of Bhim Singh through emphasising the Maharana’s physicality and the volume of his body, often shown semi-naked. He is presented as an ideal of male beauty (Molly E. Aitken, The Intelligence of Tradition in Rajput Court Painting, New York, 2010, p.217-18). In our portrait the Maharana is shown fully clothed but the sense of his tangible physicality remains. His forearm spills over the balustrade and the thick impasto jewels serve to raise the painting out of the two-dimensional plane.
Although Chokha may have excelled in his expression of sringara rasa, the present portrait is an example that the artist was equally adept at expressing vira rasa (heroic sentiment). Whilst maintaining the tangible physicality discussed by Aitken, Chokha’s more formal portraits of the Maharana are capable of reflecting strength and regal dignity. This is found in a painting of Maharana Bhim Singh returning from a boar hunt, dated 1803 which Andrew Topsfield credits as the artist reaching the ‘height of his powers’ (San Diego Museum of Art, 1990.640;Topsfield, op.cit., fig. 197, p.221). Another vira rasa portrait of Bhim Singh is a very large half life-size painting on cloth in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford (1985.31), the face of which bears a striking resemblance to the present portrait suggesting that the two were painted at a similar time. Our depiction of Bhim Singh is also very similar to a mural portrait of Bhim Singh from the same period in the Chitram ki Burj, Udaipur City Palace (ibid, fig.205, p.226).
Another painting attributed to Chokha was sold in these Rooms, 31 March 2022, lot 103 and another was sold in Sotheby’s London, “The Edith and Stuart Cary Welch Collection”, 25 October 2023, lot 47.
This present portrait is typical of Chokha’s blossoming independent style in Udaipur following his father’s return to the court at Devgarh. Chokha’s figures are stocky and thickset, the men with strong necks and hirsute (ibid, p.221). However, unlike earlier more rigid court portraiture Chokha has been noted for his great ability at imbuing expression and rasa (sentiment) into his work. He excelled at expressing sringara rasa (erotic sentiment) through the large and languid eyes of his portraits and his figures often appearing curvaceous and sensual. Molly Aitken notes how sringara rasa is expressed in the portraiture of Bhim Singh through emphasising the Maharana’s physicality and the volume of his body, often shown semi-naked. He is presented as an ideal of male beauty (Molly E. Aitken, The Intelligence of Tradition in Rajput Court Painting, New York, 2010, p.217-18). In our portrait the Maharana is shown fully clothed but the sense of his tangible physicality remains. His forearm spills over the balustrade and the thick impasto jewels serve to raise the painting out of the two-dimensional plane.
Although Chokha may have excelled in his expression of sringara rasa, the present portrait is an example that the artist was equally adept at expressing vira rasa (heroic sentiment). Whilst maintaining the tangible physicality discussed by Aitken, Chokha’s more formal portraits of the Maharana are capable of reflecting strength and regal dignity. This is found in a painting of Maharana Bhim Singh returning from a boar hunt, dated 1803 which Andrew Topsfield credits as the artist reaching the ‘height of his powers’ (San Diego Museum of Art, 1990.640;Topsfield, op.cit., fig. 197, p.221). Another vira rasa portrait of Bhim Singh is a very large half life-size painting on cloth in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford (1985.31), the face of which bears a striking resemblance to the present portrait suggesting that the two were painted at a similar time. Our depiction of Bhim Singh is also very similar to a mural portrait of Bhim Singh from the same period in the Chitram ki Burj, Udaipur City Palace (ibid, fig.205, p.226).
Another painting attributed to Chokha was sold in these Rooms, 31 March 2022, lot 103 and another was sold in Sotheby’s London, “The Edith and Stuart Cary Welch Collection”, 25 October 2023, lot 47.