Women playing at cross-dressing (c. 1680–1700; border added 1800s): Art, History and Details

Women playing at cross-dressing (c. 1680–1700; border added 1800s) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

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

In this scene harem women act out the visit of a prince. One of them has donned a man’s royal feathered turban, and a lady affectionately offers a cup of wine as attendants stand by with two more bottles, a fan, and a rose. The master artist of an Indian painting workshop would draw the composition and make visual notations as to which colors and patterns should be used. The drawing would then be given to a colorist to paint, with final details rendered by another artist or the initial master.

Object facts

• Title: Women playing at cross-dressing
• Date: c. 1680–1700; border added 1800s
• Culture: India, Golconda, Deccan, 17th century
• Type: Painting
• Technique: ink heightened with colors on paper
• Dimensions: Page: 33.5 x 26.7 cm (13 3/16 x 10 1/2 in.); Painting: 23.6 x 16 cm (9 5/16 x 6 5/16 in.)
• Collection: Indian Art
• Department: Indian and Southeast Asian Art
• Accession number: 2013.290

A detail from the museum

Heavy eyelids give a languorous quality to paintings made in Golconda.

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

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.