HINDOLA RAGA: AN ILLUSTRATION FROM A RAGAMALA SERIES, DECCAN, BIDAR, circa 1725

Gangoly and Goswamy 1957, frontispiece
Welch 1973, pp.138-139, no.82
Zebrowski 1983, no.203 

The Ragamalas are visual depictions of musical modes and were universally popular as subjects for Indian miniature painting. Hindola means "swing" and the usual image of this mode is a prince (often Lord Krishna, with or without consort) seated on a swing with female attendants and musicians. It is meant to be sung in the morning and is connected with spring.

This miniature was catalogued twice by Mark Zebrowski, once in the catalogue accompanying the exhibiton A Flower from Every Meadow (Welch 1973, p.139), where he attributed it to Hyderabad in the mid 18th century, and again in his own 1983 publication Deccani Painting (no.203, p.232), by which time he had refined his thoughts and suggested an origin in Bidar in the first quarter of the 18th century.

Only four other pages of this high quality series survive, all  formerly in the possession of Nasli Heeramaneck and now in the Nelson-Atkins Museum, Kansas City, acquired by them in 1931 (see Zebrowski 1983, nos.199-202 and Heeramaneck 1984, pls.241-244). Zebrowski discerned  the hands of three different artists, commenting that the artist of the present work "has a more original spirit...although the mood is formal and the colours are dark tones of green, black and tan, gorgeous details compensate. We delight in the baroque bouquets of flowers, chirping red parrots and toy palm trees. But what makes this picture so powerful compared to its companions? Perhaps it is the bold diagonals leading towards the mysterious white castle on a hill, which provide a welcome escape from the rigidity of the terrace world." (p.227).

The atelier that produced this Ragamala series may also have been responsible for a series of manuscript illustrations produced at Bidar at the same period, some of which were historical scenes related to the Qutb Shahi dynasty of Golconda, and others mythological scenes. Folios from this group are present in the Fondation Custodia, Paris, the Rietberg Museum, Zurich and the San Diego Museum of Art (formerly Edwin Binney Collection) (see Gahlin 1991, no.46, 47; Zebrowski 1983, nos.195-198; Binney 1973, no.148, pp.170-171), and in private collections (see sales in these rooms 3 May 2001, lot 83, and 25 April 2002, lot 52).