Nainsukh

This article deals with the Indian painter of that name; for the biography of this painter see Nainsukh (film) .

Nainsukh (literally "joy of the eye"; * around 1710 in Guler ; † 1778 in Basohli ) was an Indian painter . He was the younger son of Pandit Seu and, like his older brother Manaku, was considered one of the most important representatives of Pahari painting . Around 1740 he left the family workshop in Guler and moved to Jasrota . He painted most of his works for the local ruler Mian Zorowar Singh and his son Balwant Singh . With his adaptations of elements of Mughal painting , he was a central figure in the further development of Pahari painting in the middle of the 18th century.

Life

Nainsukh was born around 1710 in Guler, the place where his father successfully ran a painting workshop. From an early age, like his brother Manaku, who was around ten years his senior, under the care of his father, he was introduced to all aspects of painting. At that time, more and more pictures by Mughal painters came to the remote valleys of the Western Himalayas . In contrast to the more conservative brother Manaku, who developed the styliom of father Seu more carefully, Nainsukh adopted the new elements of Mughal painting much more in the traditional Pahari styliom of his family.

Around 1740 Nainsukh left his father's family workshop in Guler and moved to Jasrota. It is unknown whether disputes about style issues in painting or economic reasons (a relatively small principality like Guler might not have enough space for two painters of the size of a Manaku and a Nainsukh) led to this. In the small but prosperous Principality of Jasrota, Nainsukh worked for various patrons. The most important was Raja Balwant Singh (1724–1763), whom he accompanied for almost 20 years until his untimely death.

The relationship between the art-loving Balwant Singh and Nainsukh must have been very close, because Nainsukh seems to have often accompanied his patron and observed his everyday life closely. He also created depictions that show, for example, how his beard is trimmed, how he looks out of a window of his palace, how he stripped of his formal clothes, wrapped in a blanket, relaxes in front of the fireplace or how he smokes a water pipe Listens to court musicians and scrutinizes pictures. The close connection between Nainsukh and Balwant Singh is also evident in the fact that after the early death of his patron in 1763, he brought his ashes to Haridwar together with family members . (Nainsukh's entry in the pilgrimage register at that time is an important source for the reconstruction of his life and work; moreover, the discovery of this entry was decisive in order to gradually emphasize the importance of the individual artist in Indian art history.)

Then he was in the service of Amrit Pal (ruled around 1757–1778), a nephew of Balwant Singh and Prince von Basohli , who was known for his religious interests - he even renounced the throne to devote his life to meditation to be able to. For him, Nainsukh will have tackled completely new projects. In the family workshop that Nainsukh ran towards the end of his life in Basohli, he seems to have worked with his nephew Fattu (approx. 1725 - approx. 1785, son of Manaku) and his youngest son Ranjha (approx. 1750-1830). He also had three other sons: Kama (approx. 1735– approx. 1810), Gaudhu (approx. 1740–1820) and Nikka (approx. 1745–1833). As painters, they too carried on the naturalistic and graceful new Pahari style that was influenced by Nainsukh.

plant

Mian Mukund Dev von Jasrota on a horse ride , attributed to Nainsukh, around 1740–1745 ( Victoria & Albert Museum , London)

Although much of his work may have been lost, a total of around 100 works by Nainsukh have survived. Four of them bear his signature.

The early work is inadequately documented. Nainsukh seems to have come into contact with the works of the Mughal painters early on. His precise powers of observation will have helped him to quickly acquire elements of this style, which is new for the Pahari region. Influences can also be demonstrated in terms of composition.

The best-documented phase of his work lasts from around 1740 to 1763 when he was working in Jasrota. He portrayed Prince Balwant Singh there in innumerable pictures, although surprisingly not a single picture is known that showed him in a purely formal situation. Rather, he portrays his patron in the most varied of life situations in a very personal way. As a result, many images appear almost like parts of a visual diary. It is characteristic how Nainsukh captures specific situations and moods with great sensitivity. When depicting faces, he avoided stylized types and created real portraits. The impulses that he may have received from studying the works of the Mughal painters are also evident in the naturalistic approach to depicting trees and leaves and in the endeavor to create a continuous depth of space.

In his last creative phase from 1763 until his death in 1778, Nainsukh began to deal with designs for a Gitagovinda series. Presumably he was no longer involved in their execution himself, but rather left them to his children and nephews as an artistic legacy in the handicraft tradition of the family workshop.

As a senior artist at the Bhuri Singh Museum, the painter Vijay Sharma has been trying to revive this style since around 1990 through his own compositions, copies and teaching students.

literature

• BN Goswamy, Eberhard Fischer: Pahari master: courtly painting from the mountains of northern India. Museum Rietberg, Zurich 1990, ISBN 3-907070-30-5 .
• BN Goswamy: Nainsukh of Guler: A great Indian Painter from a Small Hill-State. Museum Rietberg, Zurich 1997, ISBN 3-907070-76-3 ( Artibus Asiae: Supplementum . Volume XLI).
• BN Goswamy, Eberhard Fischer: Nainsukh of Guler. In: Milo C. Beach, Eberhard Fischer, BN Goswamy (Ed.): Masters of Indian Painting. Artibus Asiae Publishers, Zurich 2011, ISBN 978-3-907077-50-4 , pp. 659-686 ( Artibus Asiae: Supplementum . Volume 48.2).

Individual evidence

Commons : Nainsukh  - collection of images, videos and audio files

1. ↑ For the date of birth see Pahari Master , p. 268.
2. ↑ See BN Goswamy: Pahari Painting: The Family as the Basis of Style. In: Marg . Volume 21, No. 4, 1968, pp. 17-62. See also Pahari Masters , pp. 269–270.
3. ↑ Pahari Master , p. 307.
4. ↑ A list of his works in BN Goswamy, Eberhard Fischer: Nainsukh of Guler. In: Milo C. Beach, Eberhard Fischer, BN Goswamy (Ed.): Masters of Indian Painting. Artibus Asiae Publishers, Zurich 2011, vol. 2, here pp. 689–694.
5. ↑ en: Chamba, Himachal Pradesh # Bhuri Singh Museum