Spotbilled Pelican c. 1780 - 1782
ramdas
toned paper
light pencil work
pencil sketch
possibly oil pastel
pencil drawing
coffee painting
animal drawing portrait
watercolour illustration
watercolor
warm toned green
"Spotbilled Pelican" is a watercolor painting by the Indian artist Ram Das from the late 18th century. The painting, now housed at the Minneapolis Institute of Art, depicts a pelican in a detailed and lifelike manner, showcasing the artist's keen observation of nature. The artist meticulously renders the bird's plumage, emphasizing the texture and colors of its feathers, and the intricate details of its webbed feet. This painting is a fine example of Mughal-style naturalism, which developed in India under Mughal rule.
Comments
The famed ‘Impey Album,’ to which these 11 natural history studies originally belonged, marks the beginning of a new school in the canon of Indian Painting: that is “Company Painting’’—so called after the British East India Company, which by 1757 had taken effective rule over the sub-continent—spanning from c. 1760-1880 and distinguished by native painters adapting to the needs of Colonial tastes. The result was an emergence of a distinctive Anglo-Indian aesthetic, which we see in the remarkable paintings here. Between 1777-1783, Lady Mary Impey, wife of the recently appointed Chief Justice of Bengal, Sir Elijah Impey, commissioned three artists: a Muslim, Shaik Zain ud-Din, and two Hindus, Bhawani Das and Ram Das (all of whom trained in a Provincial Mughal atelier in the neighboring city of Patna) to record the newfound wonders of her Calcutta aviary and menagerie.
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