Krishna Fluting
Brilliantly set off against a flat red ground, Krishna’s blue body is the focus of the brown cow, lured to the god by the melody of his flute. Even the plantain and cypress trees seem to point in his direction. The figural style of the artists of this Rajput kingdom effortlessly shows the head turned in one direction, while the feet point the opposite way, contributing to Krishna’s superhuman appearance. Below, a herdsman struggles to manage a spotted cow in front of a temple with a linga, a stylized phallic form that identifies the presence of the Hindu god Shiva. This fluting scene refers to Krishna’s coming of age as a cowherd.
Colors in this work
Details
- Artist
- Unknown artist
- Date
- c. 1675–1700
- Medium
- Gum tempera on paper
- Dimensions
- miniature: height 0.172 m, width 0.095 m; page: height 0.219 m, width 0.143 m
- Department
- Indian and Southeast Asian Art
- Holding institution
- Cleveland Museum of Art
- Palette
-
Select a color to find related artworks.
- Image provider
- cleveland-museum-of-art
- License
- CC0-1.0
- Credit
- Purchase and partial gift from the Catherine and Ralph Benkaim Collection; Severance and Greta Millikin Purchase Fund
Art Genome Taxonomy
11 tags
Subject Matter
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Deities and Holy Figures Both · 99%
The image centers an ornamented blue divine figure, and the Cleveland Museum of Art identifies him as Krishna in a fluting scene.
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Animals Both · 99%
Several cows are visibly depicted; the catalog describes Krishna’s brown cow, a herdsman, and a spotted cow.
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Narrative Both · 97%
The image presents an identifiable scene involving Krishna, animals, a herdsman, vegetation, and a shrine; the catalog describes it as a fluting scene referring to Krishna’s coming of age as a cowherd.
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Mythology and Religion Both · 97%
Krishna, a Hindu deity, is the central figure, and the shrine contains a linga that the catalog associates with the Hindu god Shiva.
Visual Qualities
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Flatness Visual · 97%
The figures, animals, trees, and shrine are arranged within broad, largely unmodulated fields with limited spatial recession and strong outlining.
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Bright and Vivid Colors Visual · 98%
The painting uses saturated red, ocher-yellow, blue, green, white, orange, and brown passages with strong color contrast.
Medium and Techniques
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Miniature and Small-Scale Paintings Both · 99%
The work is visibly a small page-based painting, and the catalog gives miniature dimensions of 0.172 by 0.095 meters within a larger page.
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Tempera Metadata · 99%
The catalog specifies the medium as gum tempera on paper.
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Painting Metadata · 99%
The catalog classifies the object as a painting.
Time Periods
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17th Century Art Metadata · 90%
The catalog dates the work to circa 1675–1700, placing it primarily in the seventeenth century.
Geographic Regions
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Indian Art Metadata · 99%
The catalog gives the place of origin as northwestern India, Rajasthan, in the Rajput Kingdom of Bundi.
Source & rights
Unknown artist. Krishna Fluting. Cleveland Museum of Art.
High-resolution sources
- Original TIFF ↗ 5,341 × 8,094 · Cleveland Museum Of Art · Available