Lot 635
ATTRIBUTED TO JOHN SMART (1741-1811)
PORTRAIT OF DODDA VIRA RAJA (or VIRA RAJENDRA WODEYAR), RULER OF COORG (1780-1809)
Half length, wearing a white thobe and a conical hat, watercolour and pencil, unframed
10.5 x 8.7cm.
Provenance: Collection of Niall Hobhouse
* Smart, Ozias Humphry and Diana Hill all travelled separately to in India in 1785, but needed permission from the East India Company to practise in Madras and Calcutta in order to earn lucrative commissions from British merchants and Indian noblemen. Unfortunately, Humphry struggled to secure payment for his work and returned to England with large debts to pay but his own very similar image of this sitter is in the New Orleans Museum of Art. Dodda Vira Raja was the ruler of Coorg (Kodagu), a rural district in the southwest Indian state of Karnataka.
