Vishnu on Ananta, the Endless Serpent (c. 1700): Art, History and Details

Vishnu on Ananta, the Endless Serpent (c. 1700) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

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

Before the creation of the world, the god Vishnu was asleep on the serpent Ananta, floating on the cosmic ocean. When the time came for him to create the world, Vishnu’s wife Lakshmi woke him gently by massaging his feet. Then, out of his navel emerged a lotus flower, and Vishnu gave birth to Brahma, the god of creation. As plants that grow in water, lotus flowers indicate the presence of the waters and their life-affirming capacity. In this painting they are boldly distributed over a deep brown background with basket-weave patterning.

Object facts

• Title: Vishnu on Ananta, the Endless Serpent
• Date: c. 1700
• Culture: Northern India, Himachal Pradesh, Pahari Region, Rajput Kingdom of Chamba
• Type: Painting
• Technique: Gum tempera and gold on paper
• Dimensions: Page: 17.8 x 17.6 cm (7 x 6 15/16 in.); Image: 17.1 x 16.7 cm (6 3/4 x 6 9/16 in.)
• Collection: Indian Art
• Department: Indian and Southeast Asian Art
• Accession number: 2018.155

A detail from the museum

The artist has depicted Vishnu’s oceanic abode as a lotus pond.

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.