File:Finch, Poppies, Dragonfly, and Bee India (Deccan, Golconda).jpg

Summary

This painting depicts elements of nature, all of them inspired by real species but rendered in a fanciful palette of intense colors. The bird perches on a fabulous rock that comes straight out of Persian painting traditions. The use of jewel tones in the painting suggests that it was made in the southern Indian region known as the Deccan, possibly in the state of Golconda. Both the poppy and the dragonfly show up in many Deccani paintings as emblems of the seasons. Bird and flower subjects were not terribly popular in either India or Iran before the sixteenth century, when Mughal emperors commissioned botanical and ornithological studies from their court artists. This painting departs from the Mughal type with its surreal colors and its combination of species; the latter aspect is closer to Persian paintings that were in vogue in the early seventeenth century, especially those made by the artist Riza ‘Abbasi.

Licensing

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