Kamod Ragini, folio from a Ragamala

Object Details

• School/Tradition

  Kota school

• Label

  The essence of Kamod ragini is viraha, the pain of longing. Kamod is a woman who adorns herself, creates a flower-garland bed in a secluded grove, and waits all night for her lover. A halo on this lotus-eyed heroine suggests that this heroine is Radha, the absent lover is Krishna. But a vivid orange sky, which signals dawn, indicates that Radha has waited all night in vain.

  The folio’s artist employed a composition created in 1591 for the Chunar ragamala, but he played with color and created texture through dash-like strokes, cross-hatching, and translucent layers to heighten the mood. Lush with flowering creepers, textured foliage, and rippling grass, the idyllic bower is abuzz with herons, egrets and peacocks. Radha, painted in saturated hues of opaque paint that has been highly burnished and lavishly adorned with gold, glows in the landscape. She has the egg-shaped head and slim, almost rubbery body that characterizes the beautiful woman in Bundi painting of the eighteenth-century.

• Provenance

  From c.1725

  Thakur of Dilwara, Akshah Singh, Ajmer [1]

  From 1969 to 2001

  Ralph Benkaim (1914-2001), purchased from Col. R.K. Tandan (1899-1971), Secunderabad in November 1969 [2]

  From 2001 to 2018

  Catherine Glynn Benkaim, Beverly Hills, California, by inheritance from Ralph Benkaim in 2001

  From 2018

  Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, partial gift and purchase from Catherine Glynn Benkaim

  Notes:

  [1] See Ebeling, Klaus. Ragamala Painting. Basel: Ravi Kumar, 1973. No. 212, p. 248.

  [2] According to information from Catherin Glynn Benkaim.

• Collection

  National Museum of Asian Art Collection

• Previous custodian or owner

  Thakur of Dilwara, Akshah Singh (active 18th century)

  Col. R.K. Tandan (1899-1971)

  Ralph and Catherine Benkaim

  Catherine Glynn Benkaim

• Origin

  Kota, Rajasthan state, India

• Credit Line

  Purchase and partial gift from the Catherine and Ralph Benkaim Collection — funds provided by the Friends of the National Museum of Asian Art

• Type

  Painting

• Restrictions and Rights

  CC0 - Creative Commons (CC0 1.0)

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Keep Exploring

• Related Resources

  collections.si.edu

• Date

  1780s, 1760s

• Name

  Benkaim, Ralph and Catherine, Singh, Akshah, Benkaim, Catherine Glynn, Tandan, R.K.

• Place

  Kota, Rajasthan state, India

• Topic

  South Asian and Himalayan Art, Art, Catherine and Ralph Benkaim Collection, Ragamala, Gardens, Woman, Radha

• Culture

  Himalayan peoples, South Asians

• Object Type

  Paintings