Male Portrait

Fashionjewelrycentre --- The Exquisite Glory of the Preening Male Peacock

Oh the pride and joy of it all! There is an elegant gentleman, sinuous in his tailored suit, a wristband gleaming; here is the same figure painted in his Indian royal attire, with teardrops of diamonds dangling from succulent pearls.

Even grainy black-and-white film catches the glint and sparkle of the diamond-splattered breast of the Maharaja of Patiala as he parades around his palace. And the majestic ritual of Imperial durbars is shown on screen in all its bejeweled glory, as the King and Queen of England and Empire invite India's royal princes to pay homage.

Let's call it the final fling of the peacock male. For, despite a worthy attempt by the curator Anna Jackson also to bring the maharanis into the limelight, the Victoria and Albert Museum cannot help but celebrate the effervescent elegance of a male world. --------- fashionjewelrycentre.com

"Maharaja: The Splendour of India's Royal Courts" at the V&A might have had more punch if it had focused entirely on the Raj — the colonial years when the princes, deprived by the British of their absolute rule, could concentrate on the decorative things in life: the world's largest crystal chandelier or the biggest commission the Paris jeweler Cartier had ever undertaken (resetting the majestic Patiala diamonds).

The earlier part of the show, putting the Maharajas into their 18th-century context, after the disintegration of the Mughal empire, is visually intriguing. Detailed paintings of the durbars are so vivid that they seem ready to break out of their frames. Then there is the caparisoned elephant (a giant slab of sculpture) that shows off a decorative howdah, while various thrones, in solid gold or lush textiles, help to re-create the palace world. A mighty emerald belt, now in the palace treasury of Queen Elizabeth II, was initially used to dress up a Maharaja's horse. --------- fashionjewelrycentre.com

Yet it is the fusion of India with Europe that gives the show its edge. Inevitably, a British vision of those colonial years is tinged with nostalgia. The tinny dance tunes of the 1930s, playing in a set capturing the streamlined furnishings of the era, sends a whiff of a world loved and lost — that is still in living memory for elderly visitors.

Yet it is the exquisite taste of the Maharajas that shines through, especially in the jewelry, but also in the Western-ized images captured by Man Ray or Cecil Beaton. The adjacent portraits of the Maharaja of Indore, in morning coat and in Maratha dress, suggest the emotional tug-of-war between two cultures.

With the delicate couture dresses from Madeleine Vionnet, ordered by the royal beauty Maharani Sanyogita Devi of Indore, the show proves that, once liberated from a semi-hidden existence, Indian princesses from Gwalior to Hyderabad could be as stylish as their husbands.

But the overwhelming feeling is of a celebration of male taste. Amin Jaffer, a consultant curator for the show, discusses the early experiment with East-West fusion in a fascinating essay in "Maharaja" — the sumptuous accompanying book from V&A publishing.

From the Reverso watches created by Jaeger-LeCoultre, especially designed for the polo fields of India, through Cartier's 15-piece Art Deco dressing table set, to a Louis Vuitton tea case for the Maharaja of Baroda, the exhibition shows the cultural bravura emanating from British India. --------- fashionjewelrycentre.com

The jewels are the most poignant — not just because in some cases, like the mighty Cartier Patiala necklace, the gems that were sold to keep impoverished princes afloat have been replaced with substitute stones. It's because the show closes an era when the male peacock finally folded its wings.

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