MATERIALS

Materials

Miniature Painting

Miniature Painting

Islamic miniature painting is generally understood to mean small paintings that are or once were part of a manuscript, used as a frontispiece or an illustration for a text. Drawings and individual paintings have, however, also been preserved. They were either sketches or were intended to be placed as independent works of art in an album.

The miniatures usually had a paper base, but cardboard and in rare cases cotton or silk cloth were also used. The brilliant colors are usually opaque.

The oldest preserved miniature paintings were made in around the year 1000, but not until around 1200 were they found in larger numbers. Islamic miniature painting is often categorized rather summarily into four regional schools: the Arab, the Persian, the Indian, and the Ottoman Turkish.

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ISLAMIC ART: MINIATURE PAINTING

Islamic Art: Miniature painting

Item no. 43 of 50
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Miniature. “Four Women in a Palace Garden”

India, Bundi; mid-18th century
Miniature: 22.8 × 17 cm

Although the style of painting that emerged from the dominant Mughal court had a major influence on art in the rest of India, regional schools developed at the same time in the many Hindu states and elsewhere.

This exotic and atmospheric miniature from Bundi simply radiates the heat of a tropical night. The garden’s vegetation, especially the lush trees, could have inspired the French naivist Henri Rousseau. The four women stand like gaily adorned flowers, enjoying the evening while they await the master of the house, who seems to be symbolized by the peacock with tail spread out. Sounds in the background are the crackling of the “Roman candles,” the quacking of the ducks, and the distant creaking of the waterwheel.

Inv. no. 15/1981