A Woman Holding a Hookah at Faizabad, India

Tilly Kettle, 1735–1786

1772

Oil on canvas

Yale Center for British Art

A woman in red attire stands holding a hookah, with two other women in the background. The scene is set on a patterned rug with architectural elements and foliage visible. This is one of Tilly Kettle’s most intriguing paintings from the court of the Nawab Shuja al- Daula, as the subject’s identity remains unknown. She poses like a dancer, but also holds the mouthpiece of a hookah, which elite women often smoked while seated. Is she a member of the Nawab’s household, an entertainer, or a bibi, an Indian consort of a European man? Kettle himself had a relationship with an Indian woman who bore their two children. She could also be an idealized figure, whose image would have enticed audiences in London, where this painting was sold after Kettle went bankrupt. Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Coll