Sugriva

c. 1720

Maker Unknown

Indian and Southeast Asian Art

Sugriva, c. 1720. Southern India, Andhra Pradhesh. Gum tempera, ink, and hand-colored silver paper appliqué on paper; page: 35.5 x 23.5 cm (14 x 9 1/4 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Gift of Mr. and Mrs. William E. Ward 1975.73 The seated monkey king Sugriva presents the “fear not” gesture with his right hand. He served as Rama’s faithful ally during the war against Ravana. This work appears to have been made for French Jesuit missionaries by South Indian temple muralists. During the 1700s, missionaries commissioned sets of paintings from which they learned about the gods and literary figures popular among the people of the region. Instead of gold, artists applied strips of paper, colored with a mixture of silver paint and an organic yellow pigment called gamboge.

Original Source

Maker/Artist: Maker Unknown
Classification: Painting
Formatted Medium: Gum tempera, ink, and hand-colored silver paper appliqué on paper
Medium: gum, tempera, ink, hand-colored, silver, paper, appliqué
Dimensions: Page: 35.5 x 23.5 cm (14 x 9 1/4 in.)
Inscribed: Inscription: [[upper center, in French]] Sougrihoad Translation: Sugriva Remark: For a similar work in context, see Gérard Colas, Usha Colas-Chauhan, and Francis Richard, "Text and Paintings: A Preliminary Study of Indien 745, a Manuscript of the Bibliothèque nationale de France," in Cracow Indological Studies, vol. XXIV, no. 2 (2022), pp. 25-58. Inscription: [[lower center, in Telegu]] sugrihuṃḍu Translation: Sugriva
Departments: Indian and Southeast Asian Art
Accession Number: 1975.73
Credit Line: Gift of Mr. and Mrs. William E. Ward
Exhibitions: Year in Review: 1975
Rights Statement: CC0