Gauri Ragini, folio from a Ragamala

Object Details

• Label

  A lady dressed in orange walks amidst a grove of four trees. She holds crossed flowering staffs. Raga (Sanskrit, color or passion) is the term for a classical music mode, a set framework for improvisation. Having originated in the first millennium, ragas were systematized and classified during the thirteenth through sixteenth century, they were classified into ragamalas, meaning garlands of musical modes. A common system recognized six raga husbands, each "married" to five ragini wives for a total of thirty-six "families." Families of musical modes sometimes included sons or ragaputras as well. By the fifteenth century, ragas had become associated with specific moods, times, seasons, affective properties, deities, lovers, and heroes. Around 1590-1620, illustrated ragamala series became a favorite subject for Rajput patrons, as well as for some Mughals, such as Abd-ur Rahim, patron of the Freer Ramayana and the Laud Ragamala. Specific iconographies were developed for depicting each mode. These formulae lent themselves to variations, which were sometimes dependent on region.

  Illustrated ragas evoke mood and engender feeling, as do musical compositions. But the connection seems to be indirect. Although some connoisseurs of music may have internally "heard" a composition when viewing its image, ragamalas were probably more broadly valued for their poetic and pictorial pleasures. The commission of a ragamala series would also have been understood as a sign of a patron's cultivated sensibility.

• Provenance

  To 1969

  Nowlakah, Calcutta [1]

  From 1969 to 2001

  Ralph Benkaim (1914-2001), purchased from Nowlakah, Calcutta in 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] Ralph Benkaim purchased the painting from Nowlakah, Calcutta in 1969, several years before Indian paintings were classified as antiquities by the Indian government, according to his personal records, as relayed by Catherine Glynn Benkaim.

  [2] See note 1.

• Collection

  National Museum of Asian Art Collection

• Previous custodian or owner

  Nowlakah

  Ralph and Catherine Benkaim

  Catherine Glynn Benkaim

• Origin

  Raghogarh, Madhya Pradesh 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

  1650s, 1640s

• Name

  Benkaim, Ralph and Catherine, Benkaim, Catherine Glynn, Nowlakah

• Place

  Madhya Pradesh state, Raghogarh, India

• Topic

  Trees, South Asian and Himalayan Art, Art, Catherine and Ralph Benkaim Collection, Flowers, Ragamala, Woman

• Culture

  Himalayan peoples, South Asians

• Object Type

  Paintings