Memorial Portrait

Dating back to 1956, this is a reverse glass painting from southern India, by artist Nirmmala.
An excerpt from page 226 of the book ‘Reverse Glass Painting in India’ by Professor Anna L. Dallapiccola, describes the painting as:
“…a memorial portrait, in which a photographic likeness of the deceased with his year of birth and death, ‘1880-1956’ is mounted on the glass and provided with a painted background. The Victorian-Gothic building on the right, counterbalances the flowering branches laden with fruit and inhabited by birds on the left, thus providing a frame to the picture. In the foreground is a meadow on which a leafless tree, perhaps a symbol of death, contrasts sharply with the green shrubs on the lower left corner of the composition.”