Johan Zoffany

Colonel Blair with his Family and an Indian Ayah

1786

Image released under Creative Commons CC-BY-NC-ND (3.0 Unported)

License this image

On loan

Musée du Luxembourg (Paris, France): Gainsborough to Turner: The Golden Age of English Painting

Artist: Johan Zoffany 1733–1810
Medium: Oil paint on canvas
Dimensions: Unconfirmed: 965 x 1346 mm
frame: 1247 x 1635 x 78 mm
Collection: Tate
Acquisition: Bequeathed by Simon Sainsbury 2006, accessioned 2008
Reference: T12610

Display caption

William Blair was a Colonel in the East India Company who commanded the brigade at Cawnpore. Zoffany paints him with his wife Jane and daughters, the elder also called Jane at the piano, and Maria feeding a cat held by an Indian girl.

In the background are three paintings: a large hill scene, and two of Indian customs which fascinated and horrified westerners. One shows wood being piled for suttee, the burning alive of a widow, and the other a religious ritual of appeasement called Charak Puja in which a man is suspended by a wire between the shoulder blades.

Gallery label, October 2013

Does this text contain inaccurate information or language that you feel we should improve or change? We would like to hear from you.

Explore

interiors(4,562)
- domestic(1,823)
- - living room(303)
nature(45,215)
- animals: mammals(4,859)
- - cat(263)
  - dog - non-specific(1,046)
objects(23,378)
- clothing and personal items(5,986)
- - dress(375)
  - uniform / kit(340)
- fine arts and music(3,744)
- - painting(478)
- furnishings(3,103)
- - chair(929)
people(35,143)
- ethnicity(4,564)
- - Asian(115)
- named families(105)
- - Blair family(1)
- named individuals(12,533)
- - Blair, Colonel(1)
- portraits(4,470)
- - groups(335)
society(34,906)
- family(4,136)
- - daughter(719)
  - family(1,065)
  - father(702)
  - husband(1,426)
  - mother(1,355)
  - sister(835)
  - wife(1,595)
work and occupations(14,164)
- domestic(826)
- - nanny(146)
- military(1,630)
- - soldier(1,212)

You might like

Johan Zoffany Mr and Mrs Dalton and their Niece Mary de Heulle

c.1765–8
Johan Zoffany The Bradshaw Family

exhibited 1769

On display at Tate Britain part of Walk Through British Art
Sir Joshua Reynolds Sketch for ‘The 4th Duke of Marlborough and his Family’

c.1777
John Hamilton Mortimer George Thompson, his Wife and (?) his Sister-in-Law

c.1766–8
Johan Zoffany Colonel Mordaunt’s Cock Match

c.1784–6

On display at Tate Britain part of Walk Through British Art
George Romney The Beaumont Family

1777–9
John Singleton Copley The Fountaine Family

?1776
Johan Zoffany Three Daughters of John, 3rd Earl of Bute

c.1763–4
Johan Zoffany Three Sons of John, 3rd Earl of Bute

c.1763–4

On display at Tate Britain part of Walk Through British Art
John Constable The Bridges Family

1804
Johan Zoffany A Florentine Fruit Stall

c.1777
Johan Zoffany Thomas Gainsborough

c.1772
Hugh Barron The Children of George Bond of Ditchleys

1768
Johan Zoffany Mrs Woodhull

c.1770
Samuel Woodforde The Bennett Family

exhibited 1803