If you have seen a calendar picture of Lakshmi standing on a lotus, or Saraswati with her veena, you have seen the work of Raja Ravi Varma, even if the print was made a century after his death. Few painters anywhere have shaped how a whole country pictures its gods and its women as he did. This guide covers his best-known paintings by name, what makes his style recognisable, a famous painting that is wrongly called his, and where to see the originals.
Who was Raja Ravi Varma?
Ravi Varma was born on 29 April 1848 at Kilimanoor, in the princely state of Travancore in present-day Kerala, and died on 2 October 1906. He learned to paint at the Travancore court and largely taught himself the European technique of oil painting, which was then new to Indian artists.
Recognition came early. He won an award at an exhibition in Vienna in 1873, and in 1893 he sent ten paintings to the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago, where his work won medals. Royal courts across India, from Baroda to Mysore, commissioned him for portraits and for scenes from the epics.
10 famous Raja Ravi Varma paintings, with names
| Painting | Date | What it shows |
|---|---|---|
| Shakuntala | 1898 | Shakuntala pretends to pull a thorn from her foot so she can look back at King Dushyanta. His most famous image. |
| Hamsa Damayanti | 1899 | Princess Damayanti listens to a swan that brings word of King Nala. |
| Galaxy of Musicians | c. 1889 | Eleven women from different regions of India, each in her own dress, playing music together. |
| There Comes Papa | 1893 | A mother holding her child points to the father arriving. The models were the artist's daughter and grandson. |
| Lady in the Moonlight | 1889 | A woman seated by water at night, lit by the moon. |
| Jatayu Vadham | 1895 | Ravana cuts the wing of Jatayu as he carries Sita away. |
| Yashoda and Krishna | 1890s | Yashoda with the child Krishna. One version set an auction record in 2026. |
| Radha in the Moonlight | 1890 | Radha waiting for Krishna at night. |
| Lakshmi and Saraswati | 1896 | The two goddess images that, as prints, became the model for calendar art. |
| Draupadi Vastraharan | 1880s to 1890s | The disrobing of Draupadi in the Kaurava court, from the Mahabharata. |
Dates for some works differ between sources, and he painted several versions of popular subjects, so you will see more than one “Shakuntala” and more than one “Yashoda and Krishna”.
What makes a Ravi Varma painting recognisable
Varma joined two things that had not been joined before: the realism of European academic painting and the stories of the Indian epics. A few features recur.
- Warm light on the face, with a darker, quieter background.
- Fabric painted with care: silk sarees, gold borders, pearls and jewellery.
- Calm, dignified poses, often with a pillar, a lamp, a veranda or a garden behind.
- Gods and heroines as real people. His Lakshmi and his Shakuntala have weight, shadow and expression.
- A moment from a story. He usually chose the instant just before or after the main event: the look back, the message arriving.
The press that put him in every home
In 1894 he founded a lithographic press at Ghatkopar in Bombay to print his paintings as colour oleographs. It moved to Malavli, near Lonavala, in 1899. For the first time, an ordinary family could own an image of a deity painted by a court artist.
The press was not a commercial success in his hands. It ran into debt and was sold in 1901 to Fritz Schleicher, the German printing technician who worked there. But the prints, and the countless calendar pictures that copied them for the next hundred years, are why his way of seeing became the common one.
The “lady with the lamp” is not by Ravi Varma
One of the most searched “Ravi Varma paintings” is a woman in a saree shielding a lamp with her hand, her face lit from below. It is not his. It is Glow of Hope, a watercolour painted in 1945-46 by Sawlaram Lakshman Haldankar. The model was his daughter, Gita.
The painting hangs in the Jaganmohan Palace in Mysuru, next to a hall of Ravi Varma's works, which is one likely reason for the confusion. It was painted about forty years after Ravi Varma died.
What his paintings sell for
His originals rarely come to market, and prices have risen sharply.
- Radha in the Moonlight sold for about ₹20 crore at Pundole's in Mumbai in 2016.
- Yashoda Krishna sold for ₹38 crore at Pundole's in 2023.
- Yashoda and Krishna sold for about ₹167 crore at Saffronart in 2026, reported as the highest price for an Indian artwork at auction at the time.
His original oleographs from the press are far more affordable and are collected in their own right. Check provenance carefully, since later reprints are common.
Where to see original Ravi Varma paintings
- Sri Chitra Art Gallery, Thiruvananthapuram. A large collection in his home state.
- Jaganmohan Palace (Sri Jayachamarajendra Art Gallery), Mysuru. Works commissioned by the Mysore court.
- Maharaja Fateh Singh Museum, Vadodara. Paintings made for the Gaekwads of Baroda, in the grounds of the Laxmi Vilas Palace.
- National Gallery of Modern Art, New Delhi.
Opening days and what is on display change, so check with the gallery before you travel.
A portrait in the Ravi Varma manner
The Ravi Varma manner is how Indian formal portraits have looked for over a century. A couple painted this way looks like the ancestors on the wall of an old family house, which is the feeling many people want for their parents or for themselves.
At Yugal, the Ravi Varma-inspired portrait is one of the traditions you can choose. To be clear about what it is: a new portrait of your photograph, composed in his manner with AI-assisted tools, checked by a person and printed on a 20 × 30 inch canvas. It is not a hand painting, and it is not a copy of any of his works.
To see the two of you in it, begin with a photograph. Seeing it is free, and nothing is printed until you approve it.