The Wedding Procession of Maharana Jawan Singh
Rajasthan, Udaipur, ca. 1825-1830
Attributed to Chokha
Opaque watercolor, silver, and gold on paper
Dimensions: 16 x 20 inches (40.6 x 50.8 cm)

Jawan Singh of Udaipur (r. 1828-1838) rides to his wedding on a dark brown stallion with his attending retinue who hold staves, swords, a morchal, and the maharaja’s requisite hookah. The scene is painted against a green ground, typical of paintings from this period. Blue and white clouds touched with gold roll softly across the top of the painting. Gold also heightens the undulate hills and grass underfoot, as well as the horse’s trappings and the figures’ dress.

The broad physiognomy with its strong profile, seen especially in the treatment of Jawan Singh, and the beautiful fluidity of line, seen in the supple rendering of the horse, are characteristic of the artist Chokha. This master artist came from one of the most important Rajasthani artist families of the later eighteenth- and nineteenth-centuries. In the 1760s, Chokha’s father, the renowned artist, Baghta, worked for Maharana Ari Singh at Udaipur. From ca. 1769-1811, Baghta found patronage with the Rawats of the Deogarh, a tributary of the Mewar kingdom. Chokha probably began his professional career apprenticed to his father at the Deogarh court. However, it appears Chokha spent most of his mature career painting for the Udaipur court, and especially Maharana Bhim Singh (r.1778 - 1828).

Although Bhim Singh was Chokha’s greatest patron, the artist also painted for the Maharana’s son and successor, Jawan Singh. Chokha was active until ca. 1830, and, therefore, painted Jawan Singh both before and after he assumed the throne in 1828. There is, for example, a painting in the collection of the National Gallery of Victoria that is attributed to Chokha and dated ca. 1825 that shows Jawan Singh shooting a hare. This large portrait of Jawan Singh on the way to his wedding is contemporaneous with the painting at the National Gallery of Victoria, as the portraits appear to be of the same age.

What distinguishes this painting from the number of surviving portraits of Jawan Singh is the importance of the scene and the quality of the painting. This wedding was certainly of significance to Jawan Singh and he surely would have asked the master of his atelier, Chokha, to record the event.