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FRAMING INFORMATION
1st Art Gallery offers the option to receive your painting ready to hang or rolled in a tube.
Currently, for safety, we're able to ship framed paintings only up to a certain size. Once the maximum size is reached, the framing option is automatically disabled.
However, if you are interested in stretching or framing a painting larger than 24x36 inches (60x90 cm), please contact one of our customer success associates or let us know in your order notes. We will send you a catalog of our large framing styles and pricing options.
Unframed rolled canvas orders will arrive rolled inside a protective tube with an extra 1.5" white canvas on all sides so you can easily frame it locally.


Among the American Orientalists, Edwin Lord Weeks is arguably one of the most prestigious names. Like many other American artists of the late 19th century, Weeks spent the majority of his adult life either traveling around the world or in France studying under masters such as Jean-Léon Gérôme and Léon Bonnat. Those travels would inspire much of his work, either directly, with the artist producing several works in loco, or by providing him with a genuinely magnificent repertoire of sketches and even photographs that would inform the paintings created in his studio, which is the case for much of his work.
Believed to belong to the former group, this oil on canvas is understood to have been painted in 1883, during one of Weeks’ first travels to India, since it is believed to have been exhibited, along with other paintings produced by the artist in India, in the 1884 Paris Salon, where Weeks was awarded the Medal of Honor. It portrays a scene that must have called the attention of the American artist, where the beautifully decorated pleasure barge of His Highness Maharaja Bahadur Sri Sir Ishwari Prasad Narayan Singh is seen floating down the Ganga river, accompanied by a smaller barge that seems to be filled with servants and assistants.
The barge’s prow is richly painted in blue, while the rest of the vessel seems to be covered in gold leaf, and some tents are erected on its deck, protecting the Maharaja from the Sun, dirt and prying eyes. The scene is set in the city of Benares, now known as Varanasi, in the region of Uttar Pradesh, a place of great spiritual importance for India. Not only is it considered to be the holiest of the seven sacred cities of Hinduism and Jainism, but the city also had an instrumental role in the development of Buddhism and Ravidassia and is even said to have been founded by the deity Shiva.
Inspired by the city’s beauty and spirituality, Weeks produced many paintings of its scenes and landmarks, often depicting the banks of the Ganga river. Furthermore, knowingly or not, here Weeks also portrayed the first ruler of Benares to be a true collaborator of the English Crown and the East India Trading Company, which played an essential role in getting him the title of Maharaja, which was given by the Crown to those semi-independent rulers who acquiesced the British dominion.
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Important Notes About Your Painting:
If you have any request to alter your reproduction of The Barge Of The Maharaja Of Benares, you must email us after placing your order and we'll have an artist contact you. If you have another image of The Barge Of The Maharaja Of Benares that you would like the artist to work from, please include it as an attachment. Otherwise, we will reproduce the above image for you exactly as it is.
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