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Course: Art of Asia > Unit 7
Lesson 7: 1500–1857 C.E.- Indian Artists and the British East India Company
- Art and architecture of Vijayanagara empire
- The Meenakshi Temple at Madurai
- Tipu’s Tiger
- Christian art in India: Indo-Portuguese ivory statuettes
- European engravings and Christian symbols in the Mughal miniature painting tradition
- A page from the Mewar Ramayana
- Three Aspects of the Absolute
- The Taj Mahal
- Bichitr, Jahangir Preferring a Sufi Shaikh to Kings
- Illustration from the Akbarnama
- Shah Jahan’s portrait, emeralds, and the exotic at the Mughal court
- Exploring Color in Mughal Paintings
- A Jain pilgrimage map of Shatrunjaya
- Cashmere shawls
- The Bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara
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Exploring Color in Mughal Paintings
Court painters from the Mughal empire in India created detailed portraits of some of the most powerful and wealthy figures of the 17th century. These paintings traveled to Europe through trade, where their fine lines and majestic subjects inspired artists like Rembrandt. Learn how the Mughal painters employed a variety of natural pigments in their brilliantly colored images of emperors and elites.
This video accompanied the exhibition "Rembrandt and the Inspiration of India" (March 13, 2018 – June 24, 2018) at the Getty Museum. For more information visit: http://www.getty.edu/art/exhibitions/rembrandt_india/. Created by Getty Museum.
Video transcript
[MUSIC PLAYING] In the mid-1600s,
Rembrandt created a series of drawings
inspired by the elegant style of imperial Mughal
paintings, especially those made at the court
of his contemporary, the emperor Shah Jahan. Painters working for
the Mughal emperors perfected this vibrantly
colorful art form in the late sixteenth and
seventeenth centuries. Mughal paintings were made
on cotton fiber-based paper. Artists used an
opaque paint made of powdery pigment and
water, bound with gum arabic. The paint was applied using
brushes of squirrel or kitten hair. A painting was either
completed by a single artist or made in a workshop, in which
one artist drew the composition and painted the main subjects,
and others added details. After a painting was
completed, the surface was burnished with
an agate, a gemstone. This friction generated
heat and pressure, giving the colors added
depth and luminosity. [MUSIC PLAYING] Mughal artists used a
rich orange-red pigment called vermilion, or cinnabar,
made from the mineral mercury sulfide. A vivid blue, now
called ultramarine, was made from lapis lazuli,
mined in Afghanistan. Bright yellow was made using
an arsenic-based pigment called orpiment. Another type of
yellow, Indian yellow, was made from the urine of cows
that had been fed mango leaves. Green was either a mix of
ultramarine and orpiment, or consisted of
verdigris, a pigment made from copper
treated with vinegar. Mughal artists used a chalky
white paint made from lead, or ground-up shells,
and lampblack, which comes from charcoal or soot. Luxurious metallic paints were
derived from gold and silver powders. Purplish hues were made from the
secretions of the lac beetle. Eventually, Mughal
painting shifted away from the courts of emperors,
and its practice spread. It developed into regional
styles across the Indian subcontinent, and also
inspired European artists... like Rembrandt. [MUSIC PLAYING]