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EMERGENCE OF KAUSHIKI
KANGRA, CIRCA 1820
Gouache on paper heightened with gold
Image: 7.25 x 11 in (18.7 x 28.3 cm)
Folio: 10 x 13.75 in (26.1 x 35.5 cm)
Rs 10,00,000 ‒ 15,00,000
$ 14,930 - 22,390
NON‒EXPORTABLE REGISTERED ANTIQUITY
PROVENANCE
Property from a Distinguished Family Collection
This painting illustrates a story fromthe
Markandeya Purana.
It shows
goddess Kaushiki, identified by her blue skin tone, in conversation
with Parvati, from whose body she has emerged. The
devas
look
upon the scene in wonder. Kaushiki is preparing to leave for the
Himalayas seen in the distance. On the extreme left are a cluster
of devas who have approached Parvati for help after being driven
out from the heavens by demons. The snow‒clad mountains, river,
and green landscape reflects the beauty of the mountainous region
that characterises paintings from the Kangra school. “The artists of
Guler and Kangra had the colours of the dawn and the rainbow on
their palettes.” (M S Randhawa and John Kenneth Galbraith,
Indian
Painting: The Scene, Themes and Legends
, Bombay: Vakils, Feffer &
Simons Limited, 1968, p. 134)
A closely related painting, part of a larger Guler set, is illustrated in
W G Archer,
Indian Paintings from the Punjab Hills, Volume II,
Delhi:
Oxford University Press, 1973, p. 101, fig. 17 (i).