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ABSTRACT
This article investigates miniature paintings produced in Avadh, India, during the reign of the nawabs of Avadh (r. 1722–1856) that have been consequently labelled as pornography. My case studies include Avadhi miniature paintings that have been installed and categorized as pornography and/or as obscenity starting in the nineteenth century and into the present day. British colonial administrators first applied the label of obscenity to these paintings when they began to taxonomize and donate their collections to museums in the 1800s. In the British Library, for example, painting albums such as Richard Johnson’s Album J.42 were sequestered alongside other material that might provoke sexual arousal. Curators later marked this album for destruction in 1830. When the word pornography started gaining wider currency in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, these paintings moved from the parameters of obscenity into pornography. Rather than focusing entirely on the censorship practices undertaken in museums and archival libraries with regard to these paintings, this article builds on recent scholarship that interrogates the use of the languages of colonialism and race in the formation of the category of pornography.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.
Notes
1 This article does not have sufficient space to track instances in which scholars trained in western institutions retain the term pornography for rāgamālā paintings and for miniature paintings more generally. For the most recent study, see Boone (Citation2014, 396–408). He positions miniature paintings along a historical trajectory with pornography. For the rest of this article, instead of zoning in on individual academics, I focus on how museums in both India and England create the category of pornography and obscenity.
2 For more information on these early collectors, see Archer and Archer (Citation1955), Welch (Citation1978), Archer (Citation1987), and Eaton (Citation2013).
3 Specifically, there are visual congruencies with Johnson Album J.31 and Polier Album I-5062. Polier was a Swiss entrepreneur based in Lucknow who, like Johnson, had an affinity for miniature painting.
4 Richard Johnson’s father argued, for instance, that his son’s collection provided a ‘public utility’ for the Company. See British Library (BL) IOL E/1/85, f. 75a. In his letters, Johnson also explained that his collection of manuscripts could aid the Company’s governance of India. Likewise, historians have suggested that Warren Hastings, who was part of the same small network of collectors as Johnson, collected in order to solidify ‘the future of British rule in India’ as well as out of pleasure (Marshall Citation1973, 252–254). Presumably, Johnson, like Hastings, must also have gained pleasure from his albums.
5 For more information on the genre markers for rāgamālā paintings, see Mal (Citation1931), Gangoly (Citation1948), Waldschmidt (Citation1967), Ebeling (Citation1973), Gude (Citation2009), and Glynn (Citation2011).
6 For more information on Muslim patronage of the rāga and rāgamālā system, see Sarmadee (Citation1978), Losty (Citation1983), Zebrowski (Citation1983, 63), Delvoye (Citation1994, Citation1997, Citation2000), Michell and Zebrowski (Citation1999, 153–162), Trivedi (Citation2008), Schofield (Citation2014), and Haidar and Sardar (Citation2015, 60).
7 BL OMS/I.O. Islamic 1739, Risāla-i Rāgamālā, f. 14r. Following a Bengali calendar system, Lal Thakri states the ‘month of Baisak on the 30th of 1186’, which is equivalent to May 13. With the Hijri calendar, he states ‘1193 25th rabia’th thani (rabi’ II)’, which is May 12, not May 13.
8 BL OMS/I.O. Islamic 1739, Risāla-i Rāgamālā, f. 14r. Hijri: Muharram 1188. Bengali 1181.
9 Richard Johnson was appointed assistant resident of Lucknow from 1780 to 1782. Before this, he was mainly in Calcutta. Because Lal Thakri recopied the text in 1799, Johnson could have been residing in Calcutta or Lucknow at the time of transcription. See Falk and Archer (Citation1981, 323). They suggest that the Risāla-i Rāgamālā was commissioned in Calcutta.
10 Other copies of Thakur Das and Lal Thakri’s text have not surfaced. It most likely circulated throughout Delhi, Lucknow, and Calcutta in the latter half of the eighteenth century. Lal Thakri copied Thakur Das’ text in the naskh script, a type of calligraphy that expedites the writing process. The text is more legible in Richard Johnson’s 1780 rāgamālā album.
11 BL Or.6633, f. 68r.
12 Many of these miniatures are reproduced in various catalogues. For ease of reference, see Welch (Citation1978, 26, 84, 91, and 108).
13 Yale Library, Beinecke dl 14462274, f. 115.
14 Yale Library, Beinecke dl 14462274, f. 7.
15 Letter to the second Earl Spencer dated August 4–30 1787.
16 Jones (1799) states Johnson was in either Hyderabad or Calcutta.
17 Charbas of Album J.31 were used for rāgamālā Album J.66 (no. 4v–9v). Album J.45 also has similar compositions to folios in Album J.31 and Album J.32.
18 For Usal al-Naghmat, see IOL Persian Ms. Ethe 2023: I.O.2083. For Sangīta Ratnākara, see IOL Sanskrit Ms. Eggeling 1118: I.O.2383. For Sangīta Darpana, see IOL Sanskrit Ms. Eggeling 1120: I.O. 2231. For Tuhfat al-Hind, see IOR Pers. Ms. 1861.
19 Album J.35, 1–30, inscribed with verses from Harivallabha’s Hindi version of the Sangīta Darpana and with Sanskrit verses. Album J.36, 1–36, each picture inscribed on the reverse with verses from Harivallabha’s Hindi translation of the Sangīta Darpana. Album J.39, 1–36, inscribed with Sanskrit verses from Damodara’s Sangīta Darpana.
20 BL IOL E/1/115/, f. 75v. Reproduced in Falk and Archer (Citation1981, 28).
21 BL IOL E/1/115/, f. 76. The library ended up paying Johnson a fraction of the cost of his original asking price and gave him scant compensation.
22 BL IOL E/1/115/, f. 78; Falk and Archer (Citation1981, 26–27).
23 BL IOL E/1/115/, f. 78.
24 Two mentions of the prophet David are still retained textually in the descriptive header of Album J.42 for the kernātēk rāginī, found on folio 21, and for the rāmakalī rāginī, found on folio 15.
25 BL IOL E/1/115/, f. 75.
26 BL IOL Mss. Eur.239, f. 142v (Falk and Archer Citation1981, 307). Falk and Archer also mentioned that museum personnel sent Album J.30 to be bound.
27 Catalogue Eur. D486 is dated to 1820 in the British Library. In one of its folios, there is a watermark of 1826. A flyleaf of the catalogue reads 1830. Hence, Falk and Archer have dated the catalogue to 1830. I have followed accordingly.
28 BL IOR Eur. d486, f. 19v.
29 BL IOR Eur. d486, ff. 19v, 28r.
30 British Library, ‘India Office Library’. Accessed December 1 2016. http://searcharchives.bl.uk/primo_library/libweb/action/display.do?tabs=detailsTab&ct=display&fn=search&doc=IAMS040-003287275&indx=1&recIds=IAMS040-003287275&recIdxs=0&elementId=0&renderMode=poppedOut&displayMode=full&frbrVersion=&dscnt=0&frbg=&scp.scps=scope%3A%28BL%29&tab=local&dstmp=1481565557465&srt=rank&mode=Basic&&dum=true&vl(freeText0)=J.42&vid=IAMS_VU2
31 Victoria and Albert Museum, ‘David’s fig leaf, perhaps by D. Brucciani & Co., about 1857’. Accessed June 1 2018. http://www.vam.ac.uk/content/articles/d/davids-fig-leaf/. For more on Victorian attitudes towards classical and antique statues from Europe, see Gaimster (Citation2000).
32 The composition is repeated in Victoria and Albert Museum IS.272-1952.
33 While the image does clearly represent two figures in amorous embrace, it is not clear whether the archival staff comprehended that the miniature represented two women rather than a man and a woman. My interest in the archival treatment of such images relates to the question of precisely when the nude slips into the category of obscenity and when bodies in the nude transform into bodies in the midst of copulation. Is this an image depicting intercourse, or is it an image depicting two figures embracing without a sexual charge? With such questions, I interrogate how decisions are made to categorize and censor images when they fall across this very fuzzy boundary, especially when there is a comparable visual programme across miniatures. Such questions also point to the blurriness of the art historical debate of naked versus nude.
34 BL IOR Eur d486, f. 19v.
35 I do not have the space here to discuss fully the vernacular meanings of the Persian inscriptions located on Album J.42 and Album J.44. In short, many of the Persian inscriptions found within Johnson’s rāgamālā albums explicitly mention sexual activity, which explains the curators’ decisions to regulate these images as representations of sex. However, it is crucial to note that the inscriptions also contain a myriad of vernacular meanings and associations that are not easily contained in the category of sex. These include the lover/beloved category [‘ashiq/ma’shūq] and the erotic sentiment [sringara rasa]. For a full translation of the Persian inscriptions of Album J.42 and for a more detailed analysis, see Di Pietrantonio (Citation2018, 105–149).
36 The erasure marks are mostly restricted to the figure’s genitals. This would suggest that whoever erased their sexual organs, whether it was Mickle, the artist, or other museum personnel, did so intentionally as the rest of their bodies including their faces and their feet are not disfigured.
37 While Mitter does not mention the rāgamālā canon specifically, he argues that Victorian art critics in general evaluated Indian aesthetics informed, in part, by evangelism. Moreover, in the 1850s, the British established art schools so that new Indian artists could undergo ‘morality training’, which would allow the nation to be lifted from its artistic and economic decline. For further information, see Mitter (Citation1994b, 29–32).
38 BL IOR Eur. d486: ff. 3r, 10v, and 28r–28v for Album J.4, Album J.15, Album J.66, and Album J.67.
39 Smith arrives at this conclusion by reading the travel writings of Monsieur Jean de Thevenot, which were published in 1687.
40 For contemporaneous art historians who classified rāgamālā as a Hindu art form and imbued it with spirituality, see the writings of Ananda Commaraswamy. For a complete bibliography of Coomaraswamy, see Crouch (Citation2002). In one particular instance, Coomaraswamy (Citation1916, 66) states that rāgamālā ‘art is essentially religious’.
41 I do not have the space to do these two aesthetes justice. For more information, see Raja Singam (Citation1974), Davis (Citation1997, 176–179), Mittter (Citation1994b 223, 351–354), Guha-Thakurta (Citation2004, 156), and Kumar (Citation2015, 20 and 39–144).
42 Within South Asia, British intellectuals also helped to establish museums such as the Indian Museum of Calcutta in 1814.
43 Besides Coomaraswamy, Gangoly was also influenced by European art theory. Tapati Guha-Thakurta has argued that ‘European romantic theories of art’ were a pivotal conceptual base for Gangoly, as they helped to develop his concern with ‘sublimity emotion and idealism’ in his art criticism of rāgas and Indian aesthetics (Citation1992, 190). For Gangoly (Citation1948, 161), the rāgas produced a ‘spiritual emotion’ for the viewer and listener, especially through a focus on the sensual. According to Prajnanananda (Citation1986, 201), Gangoly’s emphasis on the emotional value of the rāgas represented his focus on the ‘psychic’. A contemporary of Gangoly was Lala Kannoo Mal who, like Gangoly, argued that the theme of love was a hallmark of the rāga aesthetic, and of Indian aesthetics more broadly.
44 Raza Library in Rampur, Album 32 cover.