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Introduction

Indian Art for the RISD Collection

August 23, 1985 - March 9, 1986

The Festival of India, which opened in June this year and will continue until Spring next year, has been conceived to provide the American public with glimpses into the life, art, and culture of India. As RISD's contribution to the Festival, it is hoped that this exhibition too will provide insights into the extraordinary depth and strength of India's rich artistic tradition. It also illustrates the Museum's commitment to expand continually the size and quality of our Indian collection: half the objects on display have been acquired since 1981.

There is no single Indian style of art. Different schools and traditions have flourished side by side in India for the best part of three milennia. Some have exerted profound influence over huge geographic areas while others have remained localized to the smallest tribal tracts. Furthermore, ruling dynasties and their preferred religions have not always been the deciding factors in the development of art in India. Hindu sculpture is not always stylistically distinct from Buddhist sculpture, for example, and most of the greatest miniatures produced for the Muslim emperors of the Mughal dynasty were painted by Hindu artists. The social and philosophical forces behind the production of art in India are too vast and complex to crystallize into a single stylistic development. In fact, it is often the ability to incorporate a radically different foreign aesthetic--such as the classical elements in the Gandharan head of the Buddha or the use of European conventions for portraying depth an dspace in Mughal miniatures--that is the most intrinsically Indian. Evidence of an ancient culture strong enough to consistently interact and co-exist with the constant flow of new peoples and cultures that history has led into India.

Selected Objects

Mathura School

Portrait Head, 100s CE

Indian

Tent Hanging (qanat), ca. 1645

Indian, Possibly Gujarat

Leaf from a dispersed Jain manuscript of the Kalakacharyakatha, 1500s

Indian, Ragughar, Rajasthan

Prince of Ragughar (possibly Dhiraj Singh), ca. 1720

Indian

Lid, ca. 1600

Suraj Gujarati

Workmen in a Garden, around 1590

Attributed to Payag

Shah Shuja Hunting Nilgai, ca. 1650-1655

Turkish, Anatolia

Qur'an Pages, ca. 1335-1350

Indian, India

The Fifth Ragini of Dipak Raga, 1700s

Indian, Possibly Gujarat

Kalaka and Sakra, 1500s

Indian, Possibly Gujarat

Kalaka with the Sahi, 1500s

Gandharan, Gandhara

Head of Buddha Shakyamuni, 1-200 CE

Indian

Two Priests at the Shrine of Shri Nath-ji, early 1800s

Indian, Deccan Golconda

Court hanging (known as "Reynolds coverlet"), ca. 1640-1650

Indian, India

Opium Smokers, ca. 1660-1670

Indian, India Tamil Nadu

Shiva Nataraja, the King of Dance, 1500s

Indian, India

Krishna and Rahda in a Rain Storm, ca. 1690

Indian, India

Portrait of Emperor Jahangir, around 1615-1620

Indian, India

Portrait of a Lady, 1600s

Indian, India

Krishna Sporting on a River, early 1500s

Indian, Karnataka Tamil Nadu

Lovers in a Pavillion, 1600s

Indian, Jodhpur, Rajasthan

Man Singh of Jodhpur before the Holy Man Jalandharnath, ca. 1830

Indian, India

Portrait of a Princess, 1700s

More objects +

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