Krishna; Sculpture, bronze, India, 1700-1800

A good quality four armed image in the usual pose to play a (missing) flute. As usual the upper hands hold a chakra and conch, which are well detailed, as is typical of the regional style. Other regional indicators are flower-like projections from the crown, makara earrings and a relatively simply lotus base. Venugopalas in this regional style often had a a small gada supporting the bent knee but his image never seems to have had one.
Dark brass colour, light to merate wear.

Transferred from the India Museum in London to the South Kensington Museum ( now the V&A) in 1879. The India Museum Slip Book entry, number 278, states that it was received from the 'McKenzie Collection'. Colonel Colin Mackenzie was a British antiquarian who completed a major survey of the Mysore kingdom in southern India and became the first Surveyor General of India in 1815. Born in Stornoway on the Isle of Lewis, Outer Hebrides, Scotland, Mackenzie travelled to India in 1783 as an Infantry cadet in the 78th Seaforth Highlanders but in 1786 transferred to become an Engineer in the Madras Army. He spent the remainder of his life in Asia, much of it in southern India, where he carried out a survey of the Nizam of Hyderabad's Dominions (1792-8) and the Mysore Survey (1799-1810), although he also worked in other parts of India and in Java (1811-13). Further information can be found in Howes, J. Illustrating India: the Early Colonial Investigations of Colin Mackenzie (1784-1821), Oxford University Press, 2010 and other publications. Mackenzie's serious research into antiquities began after his return from an expedition to Ceylon (Sri Lanka) in 1796 and was made possible by his association with Kavelli (or Cavelly) Venkata Boria, a Brahmin whose talents as a translator of Indian languages were of great importance to Mackenzie and some of whose family members continued to work with Mackenzie after Boria's death in 1803.

or Andhra

540(IS)