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Bronze sculpture of a full length figure of an Indian man playing a wind instrument with a snake coiled round his left arm for the bronze 'The Snake Charmer' by F N Bose ARSA

Photographer: unknown

Bronze sculpture of a full length figure of an Indian man playing a wind instrument with a snake coiled round his left arm for the bronze 'The Snake Charmer' by F N Bose ARSA

Bose himself may have been responsible for the photography however he is known to have had his own portrait taken by the Edinburgh-based commercial…

Bose himself may have been responsible for the photography however he is known to have had his own portrait taken by the Edinburgh-based commercial photographer Drummond Young whilst another Edinburgh photographer Francis Caird Inglis recorded other of Bose's sculptural works and he may have engaged either of them to record this piece.

The piece depicts a bearded Indian man performing a traditional snake charming routine with a cobra and from a reproduction in 'The Graphic' magazine of 1 May 1920 has been identified as Bose's finished bronze titled "The Snake Charmer."

The piece is one of a group of eight three-quarter life-size bronzes commissioned by Sir Sayajirao Gaekwad III Maharaja of Baroda who engaged Bose as his official sculptor in 1915, for his Lashkivilas Palace grounds in Baroda.

The Maharaja had hoped to establish a bronze foundry at Baroda but in the even the finished bronzes were cast in Edinburgh by an as yet unidentified foundry, possibly Charles Henshaw and Son, and shipped to India.

Before it was shipped the piece was lent by the Maharaja to the RSA Annual Exhibition in 1918 (cat.61) alongside another of the Baroda statues, 'The Sahdu or Holy Man' (cat.60).