c. 1650-1675

Portrait of a Young Elephant

This elephant's youth is indicated by his downy hair and small size relative to his chains and fetter. His shell-pink ear, jowl, cheek, and forehead are painted with red, probably henna, perhaps indicating that he is being prepared for his first procession. In the seventeenth century, Mughal court painters gloried in creating sensitive portraits of animals. Artists in Bikaner, located in northern Rajasthan, had closer stylistic affinities with the Imperial Mughal Workshop than any of the other Rajput courts, as this naturalistic picture of an elephant demonstrates. This delicate image is lightly colored and carefully finished. Such works-in black watercolor but for light washes and occasional highlights of color-were popular in Mughal painting, from which the idea entered the Rajput painters' vocabularies.