A Spotted Forktail

Object Details

• Court

  Mughal Court

• School/Tradition

  Mughal school

• Label

  This nineteenth-century bird study, inscribed to artists of the seventeenth century, is intriguing in that it challenges the Western notion of a copy as not merely an inferior work but actually a forgery. Indian artists did not consider it inappropriate or deceitful to closely copy a fine painting, including even the original artist's signature. Rather, they looked upon it as a tribute to the earlier artist.

  The Spotted Forktail is a Himalayan bird that lives near streams that run through densly forested ravines. Its black-and-white plumage provides camouflage among the rocks and water as it searches for insects. To produce this copy of a work by the noted seventeenth-century artist Abul Hasan, the artist has inverted a tracing of the original, thereby reversing the image. He has misattributed it to the other famed natural history painter, Mansur. An inner border of rhyming couplets and a second border of palmettes and flower heads separate the painting from its wide outer floral border.

• Collection

  Freer Gallery of Art Collection

• Exhibition History

  The Natural World in Indian Painting (September 4, 1996 to May 17, 1997)

  South and South East Asian Art (May 9, 1993 to February 7, 2000)

• Origin

  India

• Credit Line

  Purchase — Charles Lang Freer Endowment

• Type

  Painting

• Restrictions and Rights

  Usage Conditions Apply

  There are restrictions for re-using this media. For more information, visit the Smithsonian's Terms of Use page.

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Keep Exploring

• Related Resources

  collections.si.edu

• Date

  1800s, 1890s

• Place

  India

• Topic

  South Asian and Himalayan Art, Art, Animals, Reign of Jahangir (1605 - 1627), Mughal dynasty (1526 - 1858), Birds, Spotted forktail

• Culture

  Himalayan peoples, South Asians

• Object Type

  Paintings