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| 01/07/1974 |
| REVIEW OF INDIAN PAINTINGS FROM THE PUNJAB HILLS |
Review of INDIAN PAINTINGS FROM THE PUNJAB HILLS: a survey and history of Pahari Miniature painting, by W. G. Archer, (1973)
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| The sudden wealth of Indian miniature paintings in the past fifty years or so has had an inflationary effect upon their study. Too many scholars have been chasing too few facts. Attempts have from time to time been made to devalue surplus material in circulation, to absorb hypotheses rendered valueless by research, and as often as not these very attempts have themselves been the cause of further currency. Facts remained in short supply. |
| Students of Pahari painting received a lesser inheritance of historical data than their colleagues on Mughal painting did, for the thirty-five feudal states, articulated within a total area of about thirty thousand square miles of hilly tracts in northern India, were minor princedoms. They swayed within these confines, occasionally lurching across each other’s borders in petty conflict. Their ambitions were contained by the stronger forces surrounding them, in the south by the Mughals and later by the Sikhs. Their attitudes were therefore understandably provincial and their independence tenuous. Despite these conditions, their rulers maintained a flamboyant pride in their Rajput origins and customs, which permitted them to rear naturally a tradition of artistic expression inspired by religion, something that the Mughals were able only to foster artificially. The main evidence of this expression is in miniature paintings from most of the Hill States. |
| The author, Dr. W. G. Archer, set the pace for modern scholars in this quest with a series of essays on ‘Indian Painting in the Punjab Hills’ (1952), continued by identifying many of the distinctive styles practiced in the Central Indian and Rajasthani states, moved northwards to a definitive study on the Sikhs, eastwards to Kalighat and now has returned to the Hill States with this comprehensive survey of paintings done there. The technique he has used to chart his survey is stylistic evidence on Pahari painting by which ‘to connect it with its natural environment’, as E. B. Havell had advised future art-historians on India to do sixty-five year ago. |
| His task with the Sikhs was made easier by the evocative pens of Emily Eden, Osborne, Honigberger and others. The Hill States, though, lay off the beaten track their exposure was left to the enterprising few, among them Vigne, Ujfalvy and the intrepid young veterinary surgeon William Moorcroft. Until recently the latter’s published diary was thought to provide a firsthand account of painting as he saw it at the court of Raja Sansar Chand (1775 – 1823) of Kangra. Dr. Archer’s research, however, has disclosed that in fact H. H. Wilson’s edited version of the manuscript journal was an inaccurate paraphrase and that precious references in the original journal to the subject matter of paintings seen by Moorcroft in Sansar Chand’s collection were far more detailed and specific than had hitherto been realized. To such authentic sources Dr. Archer has added the subsequent researches by Hutchison and Vogel, by Kahan Singh Balauria and by B. N. Goswamy on the history and genealogy of the Pahari ruling families and their artists. |
| By first taking the reader around the State, as it were, the author introduces each Pahari personality (for not all were rajas and not all rajas were rulers) in a succinct biography. Known portraits of the some person are listed, the veracity of inscriptions is critically examined and portraits of doubtful authenticity have been excluded. As emphasized by the author, Vogel writing in 1947 warned us of his experience with zealous dealers who would, responding quickly to his desire to acquire portraits, inscribe the name of some well-known raja on the pictures offered by the. Their ingenuity in the cases of better known Pahari rulers can be easily detected, but one has to guard against inscriptions or identifications which though not perhaps modern are certainly not contemporary with the subject portrayed. The listing of known portraits affords an ideal opportunity for weeding out the spurious. Occasionally one or two doubtful ones slip past as perhaps in the portraits of Raja Abhiraj Singh of Jaswan — Kangra 8 (iii) and (iv). These do not seem to be the same persons although differences in age and cut of beard have to be allowed for. |
| The accumulation of known portraits, the use of a particular portrait or its inscription as a pivot for its companions and the resulting often brilliant reconstruction of the life or career of the personage from the collected evidence is a justification enough for the author’s efforts. What Bernard Berenson was able to achieve in the reincarnation of ‘amico di Sandro’, Dr. Archer has extended to a host of Pahari nobles and their artists. Minor Rajas who did not rule such as Bishan Singh of Guler, the eldest son of Raja Dalip Singh (1695-1741) of Guler, and Raja Balwant Singh (born 1724, died 1763) of Jammu, the youngest son of Raja Dhrub Dev (1703 c. 1735) emerge in the ranks. |
| From the skeins of information on Raja Balwant Singh, the author has managed to retrace the movements of the raja’s establishment between his home at Jammu, his country residence at Jasrota and the palace he built for himself fin his jagir at Saruin. The intimate portraits of the raja are invaluable aids. From the early ‘studio’ portrait of him, self-consciously inscribed by him at the age of 19 in 1743, we watch him grow into an expansive maturity, being rendered unto as Caesar in public audience and in turn rendering unto in private puja. We share his sports, his animals, look in during summer as he writes in camp and again in the winter; we admire as he did the skill of his painter Nainsukh, and we feel for him as he sits resignedly in what Dr. archer has identified as the last picture in the series of his life—the Allegory of Disaster. The calm acceptance of the raja’s countenance at the fickleness of lady luck is in keeping with his character as we have begum to recognize it. The words of the song from the inscription on the Nainsukh portrait of him painted in 1748, seem to echo back: ‘To your entreaties, my lady friend, I shall listen no more’. |
| In emphasizing the religious preferences of various States, the obsession with the themes inspired by Vishnu, Shiva or the Devi is explained. The allegiance of Kulu to Raghunath (or Rama) for example throws light on the intriguing Kulu picture of phulasajya (or flower dressing). Kulu 12. By comparison with Kulu 6 and 26, the author, following S. N. Gupta, has identified the seated figures as Radha and Krishna. This interpretation is supported by the inclusion of cow-herds and cattle around them. Yet the male figure holds a bow and crescent-tipped arrow, both of which are attributes of Rama. Evidently the dominant worship of Rama has here rubbed off on the traditional depiction of Krishna and has resulted in this highly ambiguous study. |
| To have ignored a description of the geographical features of this compact but varied region would have meant a denial of the deep naturalism visible in many Pahari paintings. The author recognizes the river ‘Alakanda with the twin hills, Nar and Narain’, in Garhwal pictures, and recalling his earlier insistence on the association of cypresses with Guler proper, notes ruefully and with relief that at Kangra these trees were visible only at the palace of the raja, built in 1905. |
| A complete bibliographical summary of al published references to painting in each State precedes the catalogue entries of individual paintings. The catalogue uses the rich collection in the Victoria and Albert Museum as a frame-work amplified by related and relevant examples from other collections. Against this device of a colourful backcloth of historical, religious and social evidence the author allows his numerous players to strut, as rajas are wont to do, and fret, as artists sometimes do. |
| The primary classification of paintings is into ‘schools’ linked with political States, but Dr. Archer has avoided the tendency of some authors to maintain a rigid geographical demarcation of styles. He reminds us throughout of the sponsorship of the nobility of dependence of the style for its continuity upon the interest of its patron and of his successor. It was precisely the interruption of this beam of patronage that resulted in the movement of artists from one state to another, and what is significant the ultimate adaptation of the artist’s style to his new environment. Often the migration took place under happier circumstances, such as after the visit of one patron to another. This possibility is suggested by the splendid picture of Raja Prakash Chand (173-1790) of Guler being visited by the younger but self-possessed Raja Sansar Chand of Kangra (Guler 52). This particular picture is interesting for it amalgamates the figures of these rajas as they appear in two separate studies, the one of Raja Prakash Chand being in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston and the other of Raja Sansar Chand in the Lahore Museum. This latter picture for some reason has not been included by Dr. Archer in his select list of the portraits of the raja. Both were royal patrons, both perhaps subconsciously rivals—and one is reminded at once of the famous encounter between Kings Henry VIII of England and Francis I of France on the Field of the Cloth of Gold. In the catalogue, clues are sought, inscriptions deciphered, portraits placed and likely provenances established. The output of artists, particularly of the talented family headed by Pandit Seu whose work permeates many major series of paintings, is traced and stray examples brought back into the fold. The constituents of each painting catalogued are separated under the intensity of a laser-beam of critical juxtaposition. That there may be certain suppositions in such a comprehensive survey which might invite correction in inevitable; that there should be so few is a measure of the accuracy of the author’s fundamental approach. For instance, the Markandeya Purana illustrations catalogued as Guler 17 (I, ii) do not belong to each other. The latter is folio from a series divided between the Lahore Museum, the National Museum of Pakistan and the Chandigarh Museum. Its final picture bears a date, Samvat 1838, and therefore is specifically dateable to 1781 A.D. |
| Similarly, when considering the portraits of Nainsukh’s sons, the author has omitted a reference to Nikka (the third son) when cataloguing the portrait of Gaudhu his elder brother (Kangra 19 iii) even though both sketch portraits are upon the same sheet of paper. The author has argued that as Gaudhu appears portly and white-bearded, he is ‘aged about fifty’ (p.287) and therefore the picture is likely to have been painted between 1795 and 1800. Nikka, his younger brother, whom the author suggests separately might ‘have been born in about 1747’ (p.86) would have been about the same age, although in the picture he is seemingly younger, slim and with a pointed black beard. Further, the author dos not clarify why these sketches of this family of artists should have been spaced over a period of almost twenty years when the format and style of execution of all is recognizably similar. |
| Looking at this survey with a broader vision, one stands in awe at the single-handed accumulation of facts perfectly cross-referenced throughout its 450 double column pages of text, aided by a companion volume of over 900 illustrations. One pauses for a moment also to pay tribute to th discriminating taste of P.C Manuk and his companion Miss Coles whose bequest of fifty superlative Pahari paintings in 1949 to the Victoria and Albert Museum triggered off a chain reaction of regular annual purchases into the early sixties, thereby preserving many invaluable pictures. |
| To suppose that a research work of this magnitude could be evaluated in one or two pithy conclusions would be to presume a single intention on the part of the author. His approach to the subject is as experienced as it is humane and his invitation to the Hill States not confined to a single destination. The roads are too diverse, the journeys too pleasurable for anyone to be in a hurry to arrive at any summit first. The basic achievement is a general one. It is to make us aware of the limitless inter-change of idioms, techniques and artists that, fortunately, both assist and complicate the hermetic definition of schools of painting in the Pahari Hill States. |
| Printed in ROOPA LEKHA, New Delhi, XLII (1974). ] |
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| 01 July 1974 |
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