MUGHAL AESTHETIC / TEFAF Maastricht 2025

15th March, 2025 - 20th March, 2025

Prahlad Bubbar is delighted to announce his participation in this year’s preeminent art fair, TEFAF, held in Maastricht from March 15^th-20^th .

This year, we focus on the theme of ‘Mughal Aesthetic’ by looking at the flowering of Mughal culture and its over four-hundred-year influence on the arts and architecture of the Subcontinent. It is here that we see the proliferation of two distinct cultures – the Turco Mongol Persian, and the indigenous, Indic tradition that combine to create a sublime court aesthetic as well as multiple regional aesthetic styles over the course of the centuries.

Among the masterpieces in our presentation will be two very rare 17th century Mughal Lampas-weave silk panels, woven at a dedicated court workshop for the emperors Shah Jahan and Aurangzeb. These are set with a pattern of Mughal flowering plant motifs, each under a cusped arch, with the plants alternating in rows. The arrangement is repeated to create an all-over floral lattice to produce a wondrous effect.

We will present an extraordinary 16th-17th century battle scene by the artist Nand Gwaliori from a leaf of the ‘Third’ Akbarnama, the historical three-volume Akbar Nama, commissioned by the third Mughal Emperor Akbar. Painted with opaque pigments and gold on paper, it is a great graphic achievement as the artist has layered the scene with dynamic tension and a fluid sense of movement.

Also to be exhibited: A remarkable 19th century hand-painted photograph (gouache on photographic paper) of Sadiq Mohammad Khan Abbasi IV, The Nawab of Bahawalpur, sitting in regal splendour on a green velvet armchair. He is dressed in a magnificent costume of jacket and pantaloons, brocaded with gold thread and ruched to give the outfit the guise of a ceremonial costume.  An outstanding Emerald bracelet with six magnificent Colombian emeralds with royal provenance will hold centre stage.

A rare selection of classical Indian miniature paintings and drawings include three rare Deccani paintings from Bidar, illustrating a Sufi romance of The Gulshan e Ishq and a delicate 18th century drawing of the Saka Dvipa by the master of Pahari painting, Manaku or Manaku of Guler.

A grand painting from the royal Jodhpur atelier portraying a Nath Siddha appearing to an assembly, rarely seen on the market. In an extraordinary 18th century Guler drawing, this one from the Gita Govinda, we observe a mesmerising poetic composition as Krishna Slips Saffire bangles onto Radha’s wrists. The masterpiece drawing consists of a sophisticated sanguine under-drawing ascribed to Nainsukh of Guler, the undisputed master of Pahari drawing; over it we find an 18th century ink drawing attributed to a Master of the first Generation after Nainsukh.

In the photographic medium, we will exhibit three outstanding early 20th century images by the renowned photographer and architect Eckart Muthesius. Two of which showing different interior aspects of the jewel-like Manik Bagh palace that he designed in Indore, India for the Maharaja of Indore, Yashwant Rao Holkar II and another depicting a modernist private yacht he also designed for the Maharaja.