Beyond the Taj Mahal: Late Mughal visual culture

Yuthika Sharma, Chanchal Dadlani

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingChapter (peer-reviewed)peer-review

Abstract / Description of output

The narrative of Mughal visual culture has long been shaped by the fortunes of the Mughal state. In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the Mughal Empire occupied a position of utmost political, economic, and demographic dominance in South Asia. This chapter takes the beginning of the reign of Alamgir (also known as Aurangzeb, r. 1658-1707) as its point of departure and concludes with the official end of Mughal rule in 1858. It considers the nature of Mughal visual culture over a 200-year span and the shifts from early modernity to modernity that defined this period. In art historical literature, Shah Jahan is rightly characterized as a great patron of art and architecture, sponsoring such impressive monuments as the Taj Mahal, the Mughal palace-fortresses at Agra and Delhi, and such lavish manuscripts as the famed “Windsor” Padshahnama, an illustrated chronicle of Shah Jahan's reign.
Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationA Companion to Islamic Art and Architecture
EditorsGulru Necipoğlu, Finbarr Barry Flood
Place of PublicationHoboken
PublisherWiley-Blackwell
Chapter40
Pages1055-1081
Number of pages27
Volume2
ISBN (Electronic)9781119069218, 9781119068570, 9781119068556
ISBN (Print)9781119068662
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 20 Jun 2017

Keywords / Materials (for Non-textual outputs)

  • South Asia
  • Mughal
  • art
  • visual culture
  • architecture
  • India
  • painting
  • East India Company
  • monuments

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