Rama and Sita in the Forest: A Thorn is Removed from Rama’s Foot

The scene illustrated here takes place after Rama has been banished from court,. Rama,
his wife Sita, and his brother Lakshmana are seated on a sun­ drenched hillock in a clearing in
the dense wilderness. Dressed in the costume of leaves appropriate to forest dwellers, the
three figures have been hunting in the interior of the forest, as the trussed antelope at their feet
indicates. Hanuman, the bulky prime minister of the monkey clan, and Rama’s eventual ally, is
drinking from the stream flowing along the lower border of the picture. At the center of the
composition Sita is fanning Rama, who twists in great pain, reclining on the ground, as
Lakshmana attempts to remove a thorn from the sole of his foot. The gods are new to this
wilderness world. Yet with Hanuman’s help they will learn its ways quickly enough.
This painting is a skillful medley of circular elements: the large white stones in the
foreground, the curvature of the land, the trussed antelope, and the curved swords and bows,
are all harmonized within a rectangular composition. The silvery green palette is unusual for a
Kangra painting of this date.
For another painting of the same subject, see Karl Khandalavala 1958, fig. 10.

Inscription: Inscribed on the outer border with the numeral 4 or 9 written in pencil

Ex collection: Douglas Barrett, Spinks 1980?

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

New York,. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Sita and Rama: The Ramayana in Indian Painting," August 3, 2019–March 7, 2021.

Martin Lerner. The Flame and the Lotus: Indian and Southeast Asian Art from the Kronos Collections. Exh. cat. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1984, pp. 172–73, cat. no. 65.