Vasant Ragini: folio from a Ragamala Series (Garland of Musical Modes)

Unknown artist

Vasant means “spring” and is associated with the image of a dancing hero wearing a peacock headdress. Here, he wears a skirt of peacock feathers and is portrayed as a generic hero, not as Krishna. He balances on his raised left hand a golden vessel holding flowers, perhaps another metaphor for the season. The circular grouping created by the attendant female musicians consciously evokes Krishna’s raslila dance with the gopis.