This Company painting is from a portfolio of drawings by Delhi artists working in Calcutta. They were commissioned by Colonel Pownell Phipps, Superintendent and Inspector of Public Buildings, Calcutta, 1816-1822, and were presented to the Museum by his son, Colonel Ramsay W. Phipps. The pictures are clearly copies of earlier standard paintings that the artists had brought with them to Calcutta as models. This one shows the front elevation of the mausoleum completed in 1616 at Sikandra near Agra to house the remains of the Mughal emperor Akbar (r.1556-1605).

‘Company paintings' were produced by Indian artists for Europeans living and working in the Indian subcontinent, especially British employees of the East India Company. They represent a fusion of traditional Indian artistic styles with conventions and technical features borrowed from western art. Some Company paintings were specially commissioned, while others were virtually mass-produced and could be purchased in bazaars.