From the early 17th century; most surviving works date from the reign of Krishnaraja Wodeyar III (1799 to 1868) · Mysore and southern Karnataka
Mysore painting
The quieter cousin of Tanjore painting, made under the Wodeyar kings of Mysore. Gods and myths in fine line and muted colour, with a low, thin layer of gesso and gold.
How to recognise it
- Delicate line and muted colour
- Low, intricate gesso relief, not Tanjore's thick build-up
- Pure gold leaf, used in small amounts
- Usually on paper, not on cloth over a plank
- A glazed sheen from polishing through thin paper with a smooth stone
When Vijayanagara fell after the Battle of Talikota in 1565, its painter families, the chitrakaras, scattered to the empire’s old feudatories. Raja Wodeyar I of Mysore, who ruled from 1578 to 1617, resettled several of them at Srirangapatna. His successors had temples and palaces painted with myths, but almost none of that survives the wars of the late 18th century. Tipu Sultan’s Daria Daulat Bagh palace at Srirangapatna keeps murals of the Battle of Polilur that belong to the same school.
The style as we know it comes from the long reign of Krishnaraja Wodeyar III, from 1799 to 1868, a contemporary of Serfoji II of Thanjavur. Most surviving traditional Mysore paintings date from his time. He also sponsored the Sritattvanidhi, a manuscript of about 1500 pages on gods and goddesses that served painters as a reference for generations. The walls of the Jagan Mohan Palace in Mysore show the range, from royal portraits to self-portraits of the painters.
In the 20th century, Y. Subramanya Raju, born in 1907 into a family of Mysore court painters, painted six of the 28 wall panels of the Dasara procession in the Kalyana Mantapa of the Mysore Palace, and spent most of his life teaching the style.
What to look for
Restraint. Mysore gesso is low and fine, the gold is real gold leaf but used sparingly, and the colour is soft. Tanjore uses lime and tamarind-seed paste on cloth over a plank; Mysore painters mostly worked on paper, over a white-lead ground. Painters moved between the two cities, so some works mix both manners.