Untitled

With nearly 1,500 species of birds recorded in the subcontinent, creating ornithological studies of the winged creatures must have been a humungous task for the East India Company which employed Indian and European artists for the task as it set about consolidating its rule in the country at the end of the eighteenth century. These ornithological studies, however, were dutifully rendered with great precision by artists, most of whom (especially the Indians) were trained in the Mughal miniature traditions. This painting creates an image of the common Indian Pitta, a bird native to the subcontinent and found in dense deciduous and evergreen forests.