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The appeal of the miniature painting remains unparalleled to this day. Having flourished under the patronage of the aesthetically inclined Mughal rulers, miniature art was made to provide illustrations to books and be included in albums as personal history. Sizes ranged from handheld paintings to coin- and stamp-sized ones. A great degree of skill and precision goes into each such miniature, resulting in a work of art that is exquisite and sharp.
The works in this section are high-skill reproductions of this medieval form of art. The colours used are highly reminiscent, the style superbly authentic, and the themes decidedly characteristic. This subsection comprises of a range of portraits derived from Mughal art of Mughal rulers and subjects, each of which surpasses the other in terms of beauty and flawlessness.
These miniature portraits are of not only the Mughal monarchs but also nearby Rajput and Maratha rulers who were influenced by the style to commission their own portraits in the same. A number of the portraits include beauteous Mughal princesses, characteristically clad Sufi mystics and wanderers of the day, and the dignitary of the Mughal courts. It goes to show how much of an artistic synthesis of Hindu, Islamic, and European culture penetrated not only art but also every facet of Indian life.
While the Mughals were Muslim invaders from further West of Asia in a land that was predominantly Hindu, the European influences could be explained by the prints and paintings brought to the court as gifts by foreign envoys. The amalgamation of these influences could be seen in the depth, spatial recession, and optical reality that characterise these highly realistic Mughal portraits.
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