A BOTANICAL STUDY OF A CUSTARD APPLE (ANNONA RETICULATA)
Kolkata (Calcutta), West Bengal, Eastern India, ca. 1820s - 1830s

A BOTANICAL STUDY OF A CUSTARD APPLE (ANNONA RETICULATA)
Kolkata (Calcutta), West Bengal, Eastern India, ca. 1820s - 1830s

Opaque pigments, ink and pencil on laid European watermarked paper, the horizontal composition depicting a botanical study of a custard apple, Annona Reticulata, a small deciduous or semi-evergreen tree in the plant family Annonaceae, cultivated and naturalized in many parts of the world including Southeast Asia, India, Australia and Africa, the drawing including both the tree branches with hairless, oval green leaves and hard reticulated peel, and a half-cut section of the fruit to the lower right showing its core, seeds and pulp, above the fruit a note in sepia ink with the local dialect, English and Latin scientific names of the specimen, just next to the inscription a European watermark with the date 1825 (?), mounted, glazed and framed, the folio 36.4cm x 46.5cm, 54.5cm x 63.5cm including the frame.

The Calcutta Botanic Garden was founded in 1786 by the Scottish soldier Colonel Robert Kyd, who originally suggested recruiting artists from China, rather than Patna and Lucknow. When William Roxburgh became its superintendent in 1793, he started employing local unnamed artists to make illustrations to supplement his written plant descriptions. Under his direction, over the next 22 years, a small team of artists was built up at the Garden and their meticulous work was admired by several important contemporary visitors. Two of the most famous local artists were Vishnupersaud and Gorachand (H.J. Noltie, in Forgotten Masters: Indian Painting for the East India Company, 2019, p. 80).

The style of our botanical watercolour shares several characteristics with Vishnupersaud and the Calcutta Botanic Garden artists' paintings. Although the design is somehow stiff, the concurrent use of different shades of green on the leaves; the chromatic differentiation between the unripe and ripe fruit peels on the tree branches; and the use of white wash only around the central core in the half-cut section, all transmit a sense of dynamism, depth and careful observation of natural elements. The annotations of the fruit's names in different languages also convey a sense of scientific accuracy and rigour, welcomed by the Calcutta Botanic Garden superintendents through the years.

Dimensions: the folio 36.4cm x 46.5cm, 54.5cm x 63.5cm including the frame