The Dalliance of Dushyant and Shakuntala

After their confession of love for each other, Shakuntala and Dushyant are tactfully left alone by Shakuntala’s friends. Sitting on a big stone slab, Dushyanta holds the face of Shakuntala, who bashfully averts her eyes. Forming a backdrop to the amorous couple, seated upon a stone slab, is a singularly eye-catching ambience of lush green vigorous trees that envelop the lovers. Above, the sky expands in luminous clarity over the vast swathe of rippling hillocks.

The text describes the place of the dalliance as an enrapturing bower of exuberantly flowering trees, shrubs and creepers cooled by the waters of the river Malini that forms a cover for the lovers. The bower or kunj is a common motif found in Indian paintings where the lovers are depicted in dalliance or awaiting the arrival of their beloved. It is a secluded space in a garden, lined with profuse vegetation, surrounded by arching flowering trees bent by the weight of the blossoms. Creepers, plantains, palm trees, encircle a brightly colored flat space, affording secrecy to the intimate love play of the couple.

The artist however, eschews using traditional symbols of the love customarily used by Indian painters and chooses to situate the couple in the midst of a veritable jungle of lush green trees enveloped by stately pine trees that dot the surface of undulating peaks and valleys that stretch across.

Compensating for the exuberant wild settings of the forest and in concession to the mood and emotion of the protagonists, however, the artist provides a lusciously flowering peach tree, the only ornamental flowering tree that one finds in the painting. Placed near the embracing couple, the tree symbolises their blossoming love for each other. While the text describes the stone slab on which the couple sit as strewn with fragrant flowers, the artist prefers a plain unadorned slab upon which the couple sit.

In his rendering of the scene of the tryst, however, the artist renders suggestions of the couple’s impending separation and grief that will soon engulf Shakuntala. The artist ominously paints a huge tree bereft of leaves and flowers looming over the bower next to the couple. The birds that are usually depicted in such scenes of love in pairs, echoing the affection of the amatory couple, are here depicted perched in solitude, their singular condition alerting the viewer of imminent forlornness that will torment the lovers.