When art serves purposes of propaganda

Sometime in the 1840s, an artist in Rajasthan portrayed a mother and her child.

- MANU S PILLAI

Sometime in the 1840s, an artist in Rajasthan portrayed a mother and her child. It was a motif popular across India—of a woman breastfeeding her infant, as in bronzes and pictures of Yashoda and Krishna. Yet something about this specific painting was unusual. The subjects were rather pale in complexion, with light brown hair. The baby was female, wearing drop earrings and sporting curls. And the costume of the mother definitely didn’t resemble any local attire. As such, the image was unquestionably odd: a traditional miniature-style work, but with an unconventional, experimental quality. Luckily for us, the artist left an inscription as to the identity of the dignitaries depicted. And so, we discover, that the lady in the image—with breasts on full display—was actually one of the dourest, most prudish figures of the 19th century: “Victoria Maharani”, queen of Great Britain.

Art has always been one of the more fascinating sources of history. The image described above is a case in point. Had the real Victoria—who presided over a court in which, the joke goes, even displaying one’s ankles was scandalous—viewed this “portrait”, she’d probably have suffered a concussion. And yet, in colonial India, increasingly under British control, a local artist was attempting to “Indianise” her as a relatable, maternal figure. He’d probably never seen a picture of the lady. This explains why, while the actual Victoria had a full, round face, his “maharani” is positively geometrical. Of course, he got the complexion and such details correct, but even so had to depend a great deal on imagination. Yet in the end, what’s interesting is not whether the image offers a convincing likeness. Instead, the very fact that a faraway monarch had entered local artists’ world view suggests a growing awareness in India of colonialism and of the white man’s rule.