This is a little gem of an exhibition, on at the National Portrait Gallery until 20th June 2010, and free. It covers the development of portraiture as a genre in India from the court of the Mughals until the British Raj, a period which saw the development of the concept  of a  portrait from an image that depicted the subject  in a idealized and symbolic manner, to an attempt to portray their character and emotions in an empathetic way. Undoubtedly influenced by Western portrait painters' ideas of 'realism', they give a fascinating insight into aspects of Indian life from Maharajas to floor sweepers (including a number depictions of the European traders living in India). 

Introduced to prints of Western paintings Indian painters began to experiment with chiaroscuro (shading) and the use of pictorial landscape settings , as in  Uday Ram's Sahib Jan c.1808 (above right). Like the portrait of the wealthy Rajastani merchant Seth Manekchand (above, unknown artist c. 1823) the picture is very large by Indian standards, reflecting the European notion that the size of the painting should reflect the importance of the sitter. Manekchand's portrait is a real example of the mixing of traditions. The huge size and pose  are typically European, the the profile view, flat skin colour and decorative border are very much still Mughal.

The notion of 'verisimilitude' may now be central to our understanding of a portrait  but  under the Mughals this idea was secondary to the overt display of the wealth and power of the subject - indicated by an intricate depiction of their jewels and finery or even their actual physical size. In the portrait right,  Raja Bhupat Pal of Basohli smoking a Hookah, c. 1685) the Maharajah is depicted literally twice the size of his servant to distinguish between the social status of the two. In this respect many of the paintings reminded me very much of the jewel-like Elizabethan portraits with their tendency to allegory and symbolism.  However despite these developments all of the images retain a purely decorative beauty, often in the intricate borders filled with twining plants and insects which seem to teem with life.

These artists were incredibly skillful - even in the very large portraits the borders still teem with tiny plants and miniature buzzing insects. It's the more traditional Moghul portraits the appeal most to our modern eyes with their rich flat coloured backgrounds and abstract elements of design. It's a rich style of portraiture that didn't return to the west until the post-Impressionists - much influenced , like Gauguin, right, by Eastern artists - who used stylized flat colour to suggest emotion.