The composition of this painting takes after the great Chunar Ragamala dated 24 February 1591. The Chunar series is the joint work of the artists Shaykh Husayn, Shaykh Ali and Shaykh Hatim, who trained in Akbar’s Imperial court and imparted many Mughal elements into the series and into the Kotah and Bundi schools in general. The Chunar manuscript is among the earliest attempts to illustrate a Hindu theme, in this case ragamala musical modes, through Mughal conventions.
The present work closely adheres to the original composition for Malkos Raga from the Chunar Ragamala, published in J. Guy and J. Britschgi, Wonder of the Age: Master Painters of India, 1100-1900, New York, 2011. p. 97, no. 44. The work demonstrates the lasting preoccupation with detailed, three-dimensional architecture and elaborately rich decoration in the Bundi workshop. Further paintings from the present series are at the Victoria and Album Museum (acc. nos. IS.42-1953 and IS.43-1953), the San Diego Museum of Art (acc. no. 1990.672) and the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, Smithsonian Institution (acc. no. S2018.1.31).