For my artist’s date last week, I went to a new exhibition at the British Museum: Garden and Cosmos, The Royal Paintings of Jodhpur. One of the images is above, and you can see more by clicking the link in this paragraph.
The paintings were exquisite, with a level of detailed craftsmanship I cannot even begin to imagine painting. It was almost impossible to appreciate more than a few of the 56 images because there was so much to see in each one.
Most of them were around 3ft by 2ft in size, so I had to get really close in to see the detail and appreciate what was happening. Riots of monkey gods, jubilant elephants, commanding maharajas bathing with sensuous women among lotus flowers and peacocks, Krishna frolicking with Gopi girls in the forest (above). Images of creation, war and self-realisation jostle for position.
I could have sat with just one of those paintings for a couple of hours, but of course you can’t do that in a museum, and because the detail is so small, you cannot stand back, so only one person at a time can really see each painting. In this respect, the exhibition was curiously unsatisfying.
And unsatisfying in another respect also in that the paintings are so stylised I found them somewhat bloodless; most of them didn’t engage me on an emotional level.
But the skill that went into making them was extraordinary, and the history and spirituality they depict was handled really well by the museum in the explanations and notes around the walls. I noted down this quotation from the section on creation:
In Hindu philosophy, the eternal essence of the universe is defined by what it is not (without form, without origin, without colour)…
Imagine how difficult it is for a painter to represent the cosmos given this restriction. They did it by using great washes of silver and gold with detail in just one part.
I’m glad I went to this exhibition, and I’m glad I went early, so only about half a dozen of us were jostling for position.
Addendum:
Immediately after publishing this, I read Lucy’s latest post, unfinished, about journey rather than destination. It made me think of something about this exhibition I’d forgotten, so here is my comment on Lucy’s blog:
…the painting that probably appealed to me most on every level was the only one that was unfinished (the maharajah it was in honour of had been assassinated before it was complete or something – there was a lot of that going around!).
All the other paintings were resplendent with gold and silver leaf, pink flowers, glorious blue sea etc., but here was this painting, a whole large corner unfinished, with just the outline of some people filled in, and water-damaged as well. It had a humanity the others lacked.
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
i love it when you take us on your artist dates. i found a tinge of sadness as i read your thought “but of course you can’t do that in a museum.” you know me…why the heck not?
i do get it, i think…i remember the first time i ever saw an exhibit of monet’s giant water lily panels. it was in nyc and what i would consider one of my first artist dates (although i didn’t know it at the time). there was a bench in the room. i parked myself there for awhile and could have sat for hours. i wonder why i moved? someone was probably glaring at me because they wanted the bench…
so, glad you added the addendum. i loved how that little piece of knowledge popped out for you as you were writing!
xoxoxoxo
You’re right about not moving on in some ways, and if they’d been bench-type distance away I wouldn’t have moved, but having to stand a foot or two back from each painting, and each one being in sequence, it really was obstructive for other visitors not to move on. Although everyone was very patient with each other.