Enfilade

Attributed to an artist from the generation (ca. 1725–ca. 1785) after Nainsukh and Manaku, Krishna and His Family Admire a Solar Eclipse, from a Bhagavata Purana (Ancient Tales of the Lord), canto 10.82 (detail); India, Himachal Pradesh state, 1775–80; opaque watercolor on paper (Washington DC: National Museum of Asian Art, Smithsonian Institution, Freer Collection, Purchase from the Catherine and Ralph Benkaim Collection—Charles Lang Freer Endowment, F2017.13.5).

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Opening this spring at the National Museum of Asian Art:

Of the Hills: Pahari Paintings from India’s Himalayan Kingdoms

National Museum of Asian Art, Washington DC, 18 April — 26 July 2026

Curated by Debra Diamond

The tallest mountains on earth rise from the plains of northern India in a series of steep hills, snowy peaks, and narrow valleys. From the same Himalayan region arose some of the world’s most beautiful—yet least understood—works of art. Discover the extraordinary beauty and unique history of paintings made for Hindu kings in India’s Pahari (hill) region between the 1620s and 1830s. Pahari artists worked in radically different styles ranging from lyrical and naturalistic to boldly colored and abstracted. Of the Hills: Pahari Paintings from India’s Himalayan Kingdoms illuminates new scholarship on the collaborative artist communities in which most painters worked. Learn about the political, cultural, and religious contexts of these forty-eight exquisite works, and look closely to enter a world of fine detail that delights and astounds.

The exhibition celebrates the remarkable collection of Pahari paintings the museum acquired from renowned art historian Catherine Glynn Benkaim and Ralph Benkaim. Some of these artworks have never been exhibited publicly before. We’ve brought these rare pieces into conversation with our historic collections and paintings on loan from the Cleveland Museum of Art. Of the Hills is accompanied by the major publication Pahari Paintings: Art and Stories and runs concurrently with Pahari exhibitions at the Cleveland Museum of Art and the Cincinnati Art Museum.

Sonya Rhie Mace, Sarang Sharma, and Vijay Sharma, eds., Pahari Paintings: Art and Stories (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2026), 368 pages, ISBN: 978-0300286489, $65. With contributions by Catherine Glynn Benkaim, Ainsley Cameron, Debra Diamond, and Vrinda Agrawal