Classical Instrument Art Print – Tanpura, The Gourd Laid Open

Provenance

'Tanpura' is composed as a page from an instrument-maker's sketchbook: a long wooden instrument is taken apart in the air and its pieces are set out on a cream, paper-toned ground. The neck hangs free of its round gourd resonators, the strings are drawn out straight above it, and small detail studies fill the corners. The print belongs to a series of Indian classical instruments drawn as working explorations, in the way an artist might fill a sketchbook while learning how an object is built.

The long, hollow neck runs diagonally across the page, ringed with brass bands and ending in a round butt carved with a lotus rosette. Four fine strings with small ball ends stretch above it, with a row of curved fret-like pieces and a row of slim pegs lifted away along its length, each joined to its place by a dashed guide line. Below, a large round gourd carved with floral panels is shown whole beside a second gourd cut open to reveal its hollow inside, while a brass collar, a pair of ornate tuning knobs and a small bridge are drawn as separate studies.

The palette is lacquered rosewood red, chestnut and honey brass on warm cream, with soft blue and orange pencil-like strokes loosely crossing the ground. Dense, directional hatching models the grain of the wood and the curve of the gourd, while the dashed lines and floating parts give the whole a precise, technical clarity. That sketched surface belongs to the artwork as drawn; the piece you receive is a print on canvas cloth, made to order.