Rati, the Goddess of Erotic Love, Takes Aim at Krishna, from a Rasikapriya (c. 1660): Art, History and Details

Rati, the Goddess of Erotic Love, Takes Aim at Krishna, from a Rasikapriya (c. 1660) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

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

In a brightly lit chamber, the heroine (nayika) confers with her confidante (sakhi), perhaps to convey a message to Krishna, who sits in a grove near a lotus pond at the lower right. In the lower left corner, Rati shoots a flower arrow at Krisha to smite him with love for the nayika. The empty bower in the upper right awaits the lovers’ tryst.

Object facts

• Title: Rati, the Goddess of Erotic Love, Takes Aim at Krishna, from a Rasikapriya
• Date: c. 1660
• Culture: Northwestern India, Rajasthan, Rajput Kingdom of Raghogarh
• Type: Painting
• Technique: Gum tempera and gold on paper
• Dimensions: Page: 31.8 x 26 cm (12 1/2 x 10 1/4 in.); Miniature: 26 x 23.5 cm (10 1/4 x 9 1/4 in.)
• Collection: Indian Art
• Department: Indian and Southeast Asian Art
• Accession number: 2018.183

A detail from the museum

Most of the white pigment has flaked off of this painting.

Collection credit

Purchase and partial gift from the Catherine and Ralph Benkaim Collection; Severance and Greta Millikin Purchase Fund

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.