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Most noted for his Orientalist paintings of Indian scenery, such as the two watercolour landscapes in the present lot, Thomas Daniell spent much of his artistic career in colonial India documenting the topography, architecture, nature and people of the subcontinent. He was born in 1749 in Kingston upon Thames in England and studied at the Royal Academy in London. After failing to achieve success as an artist in the city, Daniell, along with his... Most noted for his Orientalist paintings of Indian scenery, such as the two watercolour landscapes in the present lot, Thomas Daniell spent much of his artistic career in colonial India documenting the topography, architecture, nature and people of the subcontinent. He was born in 1749 in Kingston upon Thames in England and studied at the Royal Academy in London. After failing to achieve success as an artist in the city, Daniell, along with his nephew and artist William Daniell, set out for India in 1785 in search of better prospects for wealth and fame.

The duo travelled across India between 1786 and 1793, and created some of the most recognised and treasured views of Indian cities and towns. “They saw everything and painted virtually all that met their eyes. They travelled to places that few who had come from “home” had ever been to before them: abandoned palaces, unkempt structures, ruins of old monuments now all but lost amidst shrubbery, mouldering tombs, roaring waterfalls, placid lakes, forts perilously atop dizzying heights...” (B N Goswami quoted in Kishore Singh ed., “Thomas Daniell,” Masterpieces of Modern Indian Art, New Delhi: DAG, 2016, p. 148) Daniell was a fellow of the Royal Society of Arts and a Royal Academician - the initials RA are lettered on many of his works, including the present lot.

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