Dobrovits Aladár szerk.: Az Iparművészeti Múzeum Évkönyvei 1. (Budapest, 1954)

Idegennyelvű kivonatok

Mogul and Rajput Paintings in the Museum of Eastern Asiatic Arts E. Baktay The collection of Indian paintings of the Museum is rather unbalanced in its proportions: while the Mogul school is represented by a series of pictures, there are only two specimens belonging to the Rajput school. The disproportion in the material is due to that most of the specimens were presented as gifts to the Museum by dor.ators, and there was hardly any possibility of a systematic selection. As Mogul and Rajput painting is not widely known in Hungary, the author proceeds to give a short historical sketch of their origin and development. Mogul painting had its roots in Persian miniature art, but became much transformed during the second half of the XVI., and even more in the XVII. century. The changes were due — according to the author — to the circumstance that many Indian, nay even Hindu, artists were employed by the Mogul emperors. This fact may also explain some characteristic elements common in both schools. Yet there always remained a fundamental difference between them: Mogul painting, like its Persian model, was a miniature art of purely illustrative or decorative character, while Rajput art — as pointed out by the late A. K. Coomaraswamy — originated from the art of old time wall paintings, and its works show, inspite of their actual small size, the characteristic features of composition meant for a large surface. There is another fundamental difference between the two schools: Mogul painting always used to serve practical purposes, furnishing lifelike portraits of real persons, depicting rare animals or scenes of court life, that is, reporting actualities, very much like modern photographers do. Rajput painting, on the other hand, chose with a predilection either legendary motives or religious topics. Thus, Mogul painting flourished with the power of the Mogul emperors, and vanished with the decline of the Empire. Rajput art, having its foundations in old religious or poetic traditions deeply rooted in the common feelings of the Hindu population, not only preceded, but also survived the period of Mogul painting. Rajput art, on account of above mentioned qualities, surpasses the Mogul school in importance, being an organic section of Indian art in general. It is the more lamentable that the Museum possesses but a few specimens of Rajput art, compared to the number of Mogul paintings. After having given a short explanation of the technical methods employed by both schools of painting, the author proceeds to the description of the pictures. Eighteen miniatures in all figure in the report. As mentioned above, the major part of them belong to the Mogul school. There are some specimens of merit among them, e. g. the picture entitled „The capture of wild elephants" (Nr. 23.), showing traditional features of late XVI. century Persian miniatures; the portraits, of the Emperors Shah Jehan and Aurangzib (Nr. 24. and 26.), the Hindi inscription of the latter wrongly naming „Bahádur Shah" as the person represented; the picture of a Mogul nobleman and a servant girl attending him (Nr, 27.); the morning toilet of a Mogul lady with an attendant (Nr. 30.); etc. There are some pictures (like Nrs. 36. and 37.) which show some characteristic features of Rajput art, although belonging to the Mogul school; and there is one (Nr. 33.) which seems to represent the Dekkhani school of the early XVIII. century. Specimens Nrs. 38. and 39. alone are unoubtedly works of the Rajput school, the first being a production of the Kangra-Valley, the second that of Nathadvara. This latter picture contains potraits of real persons, one of them being Damodaraji Maharaj, a Rajput ruler of the late XVIII. century. Specimen Nr. 34. belongs to a later North Indian type, rather common in the XVIII. century and even in the first of the XTX. showing human figures in sharp light on a dark background of nightly landscape. The paper closes with the hint that in future the Museum should endeavour to acquire such specimens of Indian painting as could make up for the shortcoming mentioned above, establishing a well-balanced collection of Mogul and Rajput pictures.