Portrait of Murad Bakhsh (1624–61) (c. 1635; borders c. 1700s): Art, History and Details

Portrait of Murad Bakhsh (1624–61) (c. 1635; borders c. 1700s) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is Balchand (Indian, active 1595–c. 1650).

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

The miniature portrait of a Mughal prince is now mounted on an album page. Originally, it was in a gemstone setting as a “portrait jewel” to be worn by family and supporters at court. India’s ruling elite had been wearing portrait jewels since Sir Thomas Rowe (about 1581–1655) presented British portrait miniatures and cameos to the Mughal emperor as part of a diplomatic gift in 1616, when he successfully negotiated for British access to India’s ports.

Object facts

• Title: Portrait of Murad Bakhsh (1624–61)
• Date: c. 1635; borders c. 1700s
• Creator attribution: Balchand (Indian, active 1595–c. 1650)
• Culture: Mughal India, court of Shah Jahan (reigned 1628–58)
• Type: Painting
• Technique: gum tempera and gold on paper
• Dimensions: Overall: 28.4 x 25.7 cm (11 3/16 x 10 1/8 in.); Painting: 4.3 x 3.5 cm (1 11/16 x 1 3/8 in.)
• Collection: Indian Art - Mughal
• Department: Indian and Southeast Asian Art
• Accession number: 2013.327

A detail from the museum

This portrait belonged to a cousin of Sir Winston Churchill.

Collection credit

Gift in honor of Madeline Neves Clapp; Gift of Mrs. Henry White Cannon by exchange; Bequest of Louise T. Cooper; Leonard C. Hanna Jr. Fund; From the Catherine and Ralph Benkaim Collection

Further reading listed by the museum

• Komaroff, Linda, and Sheila Blair. Gifts of the Sultan: The Arts of Giving at the Islamic Courts. [Los Angeles]: Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 2011.
• Mace, Sonya Rhie, Mohsen Ashtiany, Catherine Glynn, Pedro Moura Carvalho, Marcus Fraser, and Ruby Lal. Mughal Paintings: Art and Stories: the Cleveland Museum of Art. London: D Giles Limited, 2016.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.