Shringars of ShriNathji

This gallery has paintings of various shringars of ShriNathji. Over the years, different shringars and Lord's festive attire has become popular with the Vaishnavs. This gallery looks at a sample of popular paintings.

18th and early 19th Century paintings, where the Lord's colour is a vibrant dark blue, details of the Shringar are very realistic, His feet are splayed and his eyes are wonderfully wide and expressive.

Diwali annakut festival with 7 svaroops - 60kb

ShriNathji amidst cows - 59kb

Janmastami, with Nandababa and Yashodaji swinging NavnitPriyaji in the inner sanctum of ShriNathji - 27kb

ShriNathji playing holi in a garden, with NavnitPriyaji in the front and a lake / walled pond in the background - 27kb

Pavitra-Ekadashi, with Gosaiji offering pavitra to ShriNathji and the sevan nidhi svaroops along with his father and sons - 161kb

Arti of ShriNathji in a golden bunglow with pichoi of banana plants - 124kb

Ancient cloth painting of ShriNathji with cows in the pichoi behind him - 64kb

ShriNathji at the heart of a visual map of the Vraj-Mandal 97kb

Rasamandala composed of ShriNathji and gopies - 172kb

ShriNathji dressed for Maharasa during the Ashwin Purnima festival. Wearing colourful clothes, the Lord is adorned head to toe in traditional Rajasthani jewels. Pichoi is usually hung in the inner sanctum, helping to bring to life the maha-rasa, showing the gopies linking arms, palm to palm, to form the divine circle ! Heavenly gods gather above in their vimans to shower flowers upon the rasa-mandala. Trees and animals are skillfully painted to evoke the scene once played out in Vraj during Sarasvata Kalpa.
Painting is in the style of Nathadwara of the 18th - 19th century - 63 kb
There are articles on the subject on Rasalila. and Shyamdas's translation.

Goswami performing arti for ShriNathji, with the pichoi of MahaRaas in the background. The colours are bold and confident, as are the gopies in the pichoi. Style is of medival Rajasthan / Nathdwara. 103  kb

Goswami offers arti to the Lord, with Govardhan Dharan's pichoi in the background. The mountain is shown above the Lord's hand, and above it are the angry dark coluds, bearing terrible rains sent by Indra. Underneath it all, bathed in bright white light, are the gopas and gopies of Vraj, headed by Nandrai and Yashodaji, adoring the strength and resolve of their darling son. 52kb

Wonderful painting of the shringar at Annakuta, complete with the pichoi and attendant goswamis offering arti. 151kb

Mangal arti in the cold winter months !  Lord wears a warm quilted coat to ward off the morning chill. 57kb

Shri Nathji wearing the Char-vagha and a "tripara" of peacock feathers. 17k

Shri Nathji wearing tie-die pichoda, popularly worn during the monsoon season. 15k

Shri Nathji playing Holi, spring festival. HH Dauji is the Goswami in attendance. 27k

Black and white picture of the Lord. 35kb

Mid - late 19th Century onwards, painter bagan to paint the icon of the Lord in much darker colours, culminating in black. A degree of "realism" entered the paintings and the feet of the Lord  faced forward, as in the real icon.  The eyes became more crescent shaped, pointed & the Lord took on a contemplative mood !

ShriNathji in "lal ghata", ie dressed all in red during a late spring / early summer festival.  Lotuses in the right hand of the Lord indicate that the arti is being offered during the Rajbhog darshan - book cover for "Sadhan Deepika" of H.H. Shri GopiNathji - 35kb

Special shringar of sandalwood paste and saffron - Chandancholi (original painting from the Haveli of Shri Mathuradhishji's, Kota, Rajasthan) 23k  
Read about Chandancholi plus other manoraths of the summer months

ShriNathji adorned for a winter festival evening, wearing a golden plume atop his gem studded turban. Even His clothes seem to be embroided with jewels ! Rajasthani style jewelry cascades to His knees and gem encrusted anklets surely help put a sparkle in His step! Richly decorated pichoi, probably studded with real gemstones and worked in real gold thread, has a tree of life motif.  Regally dressed in emeralds and pearls, the whole scene evokes a mood of glittering evening revelieries of India's princely past.
Painting is modern / contemporary, late 20th Century, Nathadwara - 84kb

Late 20th Century - till date. 

Now a days, larger paintings are often painted and mounted on stiff board/s, these are often created using air-brush technique to give fine definition and a range of hues and colours unobtainable before.  They are often overlaid with gold-leaf and studded with glass, paste and diamante.  Though technologiacally more advanced, all too often, glitter takes over the "bhav" of the painting and much of the original mystic is lost.

Chitraji of Shri Nathji enveloped in a dark green silk shawl. (house shrine) 41kb

Golden ornaments surround a ShriNathji in a house shrine 44kb

Lord wearing minimal clothes and jewels during the summer months (house shrine ) 21k

ShriNathji, wearing a long sari (house shrine) - 52 kb

A very popular theme now-a-days - Shyam-ghata - when everything in the inner sanctum is black ! From the pichoi in the background, thada-vastra, the ghardar-jama of the Lord, his slipper, the cushions, to the footstool, are all uniformly black !  Diamonds and pearls shine like stars in this wonderful winter shringar ! 24 kb

ShriNathji in a fulmandali during the Narshimha Jayanti.  Everything is saffron coloured and yellow and white flowers adron the fulmandali. 38kb

Shri Nathji's "mukharvinda" (face), wearing an ornate turban. 24k

Calendar art and greetings card industry demand a more glitzy image of the lord.  To cater to the tastes of the "modern" consumer culture, icons are produced to be more "recognizable", spilling over with jewels and encased in gold whenever possible.

Shri Nathji wearing a traditional "laharia" (waves) design pichoda. 86k Pichoi and pichoda worn by the Lord are of a matching design.

Shri Nathji's shringar for Janmastami, Krshna's birthday. 24k The picture used on this page shows the Lord dressed for Janmastami.   He wears saffron clothes in the style of Char-vagh.   Saffron is also used to make flower patterns on his cheek, to ward off the evil eye.  It also helps stave off childhood colds.  A peacock feather crown is also worn and as a special shringar of the day, He wears a pendent with two tiger claws to ward off the evil eye.  Shri Navnit Priyaji joins Him in the nij mandir and He swings in a special cradle used for the occasion.  Mukhiyajies dresses up as Nanda and Yashodaji, sharing the joys of the newborn with the rest of Vrajvasis.

Shri Nathji's magnificent golden Shringar during Gopashtami and Chappan-bhoga. 51k The special crown worn on this occasion is called the Gokarna mukut - as of the crown has two flared ends that resemble cow's ears !

True to style, a modern, computer generated image of the Lord !

Vaman Dwadashi, Gval darshan as indicated by the fact that fresh tulasi (basil) leaves are placed near the feet of the Lord - still image 2 from the excellent CD ROM, Shrinathji Darshan Vaman Dwadashi, On-Time Management PVT Ltd, India, thanks to Mr.Tejas Shroff - 13kb

Index of ShriNathji's Galleries

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