November 6, 2015
The San Antonio Museum of Art will present Realms of Earth and Sky: Indian Painting from the 15th to the 19th Century from November 6, 2015 through February 14, 2016. Forty-three South Asian miniature paintings representing a number of different artistic traditions and spanning five centuries will be on view. Portraiture, religious and literary texts, and Ragamala paintings, which depict a range of musical melodies known as ragas are represented in the exhibition. These works illuminate the opulence of the Mughal court, the actions of gods in the form of men, lively battles, and courtly love.
Works are done in miniature and contained in the small scale of the manuscript or album page. Miniatures are usually small, but the term derives from minium Latin for “red lead, vermilion” that was used to mark important words in European manuscripts. With brilliant color and burnished, enamel-like surfaces, each scene is contained in the intimate size of a manuscript or album page. Artists used fine brushes and magnifying lenses to render such detail on a minute scale.
Realms of Earth and Sky is travelling from the Fralin Museum of Art at the University of Virginia and organized by Daniel J. Ehnbom, Associate Professor of South Asian Art, McIntire Department of Art, University of Virginia and made possible with the support of the Sarah Campbell Blaffer Foundation.
A lavishly illustrated catalogue accompanies the exhibition Realms of Earth and Sky: Indian Painting from the 15th to the 19th Century.
Image Credit:
A Ruler Worshiping Rama, Sita, Lakshmana, and Hanuman
Bundi, c. 1800–25
Opaque color and gold on paper, 11 11/16 x 9 in, 26.69 x 22.86 cm
Gift of Sanjay Guha, 2010.11
Collection of The Fralin Museum of Art at the University of Virginia
The San Antonio Museum of Art is housed in the historic Lone Star Brewery on the Museum Reach of the San Antonio Riverwalk. The collection contains nearly 30,000 works representing 5,000 years of history and cultures from around the world.
