The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of April 24, 2024

Princess and attendant in trompe l’oeil window

Princess and attendant in trompe l’oeil window

c. 1765
(Indian, active mid-1700s)
Mughal India, Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow
Gum tempera, ink, and gold on paper
Image: 12.5 x 7.8 cm (4 15/16 x 3 1/16 in.); Overall: 44 x 31.6 cm (17 5/16 x 12 7/16 in.)
Gift of George P. Bickford 1955.297
Location: 242B Indian Painting

Did You Know?

Unlike in portraits of the emperor, women sit on the outside of the royal window.

Description

A golden window shade has been rolled up to reveal a princess seated on a terrace. The carpet draped over the sill echoes that of the balcony rail where royals would show themselves to the public. Rather than taking the view of an outsider, the viewer looks from inside the palace out to the women and the wooded landscape beyond.

During the mid-1600s, the Mughal court introduced a preference for the patterns on carpets and textiles: flowering plants on a plain ground. This influential fashion derived from their appreciation of European botanical studies that merchants and diplomats brought to India.
  • ?–1955
    George Bickford [1901–1991] and Clara Louise Gehring Bickford [1903–1985], Cleveland, OH, given to the Cleveland Museum of Art
    1955–
    The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
  • Ward, William E. "Two Rajput Paintings and a Rajput Textile." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 43, no. 4 (1956): 62–65. Mentioned: pp. 62–65; Reproduced: p. 63 www.jstor.org
    Leach, Linda York. Indian Miniature Paintings and Drawings. Cleveland, OH: Cleveland Museum of Art in cooperation with Indiana University Press, 1986. Mentioned and Reproduced: cat. no. 47
  • Carpets and Canopies in Mughal India​ (Indian art rotation). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (March 22-September 8, 2024).
    Art and Stories from Mughal India. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (July 31-October 23, 2016).
    Wooster College Exhibition. The College of Wooster Art Museum, Wooster, OH (organizer) (April 5-27, 1970).
  • {{cite web|title=Princess and attendant in trompe l’oeil window|url=false|author=Aqil Khan|year=c. 1765|access-date=24 April 2024|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

Source URL:

https://www.clevelandart.org/art/1955.297