Dimensions: support: 978 x 1372 mm frame: 1283 x 1670 x 195 mm
Copyright: CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0 DEED, Photo: Tate
Curator: This is Thomas Daniell's "Bridge near Rajmahal, Bihar," from around the late 18th century. Look at how the bridge spans the river, connecting not just land, but also past and present. Editor: It has this wonderfully melancholic feel, like a scene from a half-forgotten dream. The architecture feels ancient. Curator: Exactly! Daniell captures India through the lens of the picturesque, evoking a sense of romantic decay. The bridge becomes a symbol of a fading empire. Editor: I'm drawn to the figures in the foreground. They seem to be drawing water – like a timeless ritual. Curator: Yes, that juxtaposition of the mundane with the monumental – the eternal cycle of life against the backdrop of historical weight. Editor: It’s a stunning piece, and I find myself pondering how these monumental structures were once part of bustling, vibrant lives. Curator: It leaves us contemplating the layered meanings and emotional echoes embedded within a landscape.
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http://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/daniell-bridge-near-rajmahal-bihar-n00899
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This painting could be described as an exercise in an Indian ‘picturesque’. The Picturesque was an aesthetic ideal which stressed the visual pleasures of variety and decay. Overgrown, partly ruined structures were a familiar feature of British landscape painting. Despite their costumes, the figures to the right were also familiar. Paintings of the British countryside would regularly incorporate such figures, suggesting that the landscape was a place of rest and solace rather than work or poverty. Here their costumes also subtly evoke antique togas, suggesting a further link with the classical landscapes of the seventeenth-century artist Claude Lorrain. Gallery label, September 2004
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