"Gujari Ragini: A Lady With A Vina Seated on a Bed of Lotus Flowers" Folio from a dispersed Ragamala (Garland of Melodies)

A lady with a vina (an Indian stringed instrument) sits on a bed of lotuses on a bucolic
hillside awaiting her absent lover. She is pointing at a large, black bird ( a symbol of her absent
lover?) which perches on a branch of the mango tree in front of her. A peacock spreads his
magnificent tail feathers to attract a smaller peahen, approaching from the shallow stream
depicted in the foreground. (The two birds are a reference to the unhappily separated human
lovers.) The faint and cursory details of a distant town and trees emerge from the misty
background. (For ragamala painting, see cat. no. 7.)
This picture (and cat. nos. 20 and 21) was painted by Ruknuddin, probably the greatest
of the Bikaner artists, and the greatest of the local Utsa painters (see cat no. 7). Ruknuddin
must have learned his craft from ‘Ali Riza, a Delhi artist who had been persuaded by Raja Karan
Singh (r. 1631­69) to resettle with other Mughal­trained painters in Bikaner in the middle
decades of the seventeenth century. As a result of ‘Ali Riza’s influence on Ruknuddin and other
court painters of this time, Bikaner painting became increasingly Mughalized. Its colors
lightened; and Bikaner painters learned to place greater emphasis on linear refinement,
miniaturistic detail, and high finish, qualities the local rulers had learned to admire at the
Mughal court. As Ruknuddin excelled in all of these Mughalizing tendencies, his talent was
soon recognized by Raja Karan Singh, and Ruknuddin became head of the Bikaner painting
workshop, then totalling about a dozen artists, in the year 1669. He retained this pre­eminent
position until 1697, the probable year of his death.
Ruknuddin’s patrons, Raja Karan Singh and Raja Anup Singh (r. 1669­98), spent most
of their time in the Deccan, far from Rajasthan, fighting the Mughals’ wars of expansion. We
know that Ruknuddin joined Anup Singh there, as inscriptions on two of his works attest. (2)
Contact with Deccani painting only increased Ruknuddin’s respect for the refinements of Muslim
court painting as practiced in Delhi, at the Mughal court, as well as in the Deccan, at the Bijapur
and Golconda courts. (3)
For five other paintings from the same ragamala series, see Sotheby’s op. cit., nos. 132­
34, 136­37. At least three other paintings from the same series are known, one of which is in
the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art [Steven Kossak, Indian Court Painting (New
York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1997), no. 33]. For the others, see B.N. Goswamy and
Usha Bhatia, Painted Visions: The Goenka Collection of Indian Paintings (New Delhi: Lalit Kala
Akademi, 1999), nos. 113­114.
(2) Vishaka N. Desai, Life at Court: Art for India’s Rulers, 16th­19th Centuries (Boston:
Museum of Fine Arts, 1985), pg. 32
(3) For the influence of Deccani painting on Bikaner painting, see Catherine Glynn,
“Bijapuri Themes in Bikaner Painting” in Andrew Topsfield, ed., Court Painting in Rajasthan
(Mumbai: Marg Publications, 2000), pp. 65­77.
(1) For the artist Ruknuddin, see Guy and Britschgi 2011, pp. 114­16.

Inscription: Inscribed on the reverse in black ink in Rajasthani written in devanagari script: “Gurjari ragini no. 26, work of Ruknuddin. no. 1”; also inscribed on the reverse in faded, bluish ink in
Rajasthani: “Gujari Ragini #26, Samvat 1721 [a.d. 1664]”; also notated with a stamp in blue ink: “Collection of the Maharaja of Bikaner, signed Khet Singh and dated 1964, inventory
no. 3997”; also inscribed with the number “3997” in blue pencil, another number in black ink, and the English phrase in black ink “Sed.L”

New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Divine Pleasures: Painting from India's Rajput Courts—The Kronos Collections," June 13–September 11, 2016.

Losty, J. P. Indian and Persian Painting,1590–1840: Exhibition. New York: Oliver Forge and Brendan Lynch Ltd., 2014, p. 29, cat. no. 13.