A European lady

A lady wearing a high-waisted dress and turban fashionable from about 1795 to 1820 sits by a little European table. This could be a portrait but is more likely to be an Indian painter's interpretation of a fashion illustration of the period. In India (as elsewhere) it was not unusual for artists to base their works on European printed illustrations. In Europe in the early 1800s, prints showing the latest mode of dress were produced in large numbers, and they must have circulated from Calcutta and other Indian ports.