Royal Woman Holding a Flower (c. 1670s–80s): Art, History and Details

Royal Woman Holding a Flower (c. 1670s–80s) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

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

Following the model of formal imperial Mughal court portraiture, the artist has lavished care on shading the face of a royal woman and the distinctive qualities of her luxurious textiles. Details have been exquisitely rendered, including the fringe of her pink shawl with its lotus vine border and the sprigs of flowers tucked in her hair.

Object facts

• Title: Royal Woman Holding a Flower
• Date: c. 1670s–80s
• Culture: Northwestern India, Rajasthan, Rajput Kingdom of Bikaner
• Type: Painting
• Technique: gum tempera and gold on paper
• Dimensions: Miniature: 19.7 x 10 cm (7 3/4 x 3 15/16 in.)
• Collection: Indian Art
• Department: Indian and Southeast Asian Art
• Accession number: 2018.194

A detail from the museum

The flowering plants on the ground echo the lush vegetation of the Qur'anic paradise.

Collection credit

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

Further reading listed by the museum

• Mace, Sonya Rhie. “Acquisitions 2018: Indian and Southeast Asian Art.” Cleveland Art: Cleveland Museum of Art Members Magazine 59, no. 2 (March/April 2019): 26–28.

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.