Important Notice

Based on the German fairy tale The Goose Girl, this watercolour was painted by Amrita Sher-Gil in 1923, when she was just ten years old. Sher-Gil displayed a prodigious talent for art from early childhood, filling sketchbooks with drawings and watercolours. The Sher-Gil family moved from Hungary to Simla in the 1920s, where she often painted watercolours based on films and literature. Around the same year as the present lot, she won her... Based on the German fairy tale The Goose Girl, this watercolour was painted by Amrita Sher-Gil in 1923, when she was just ten years old. Sher-Gil displayed a prodigious talent for art from early childhood, filling sketchbooks with drawings and watercolours. The Sher-Gil family moved from Hungary to Simla in the 1920s, where she often painted watercolours based on films and literature. Around the same year as the present lot, she won her first prize for art - a fifty rupee cash award - for painting her first responses to cinema. In this watercolour, Sher-Gil captures the essence of the fairytale in a scene which includes the princess, the chambermaid, the horse, and a stream of water.

THE GOOSE GIRL

Once upon a time, there was a queen who had a beautiful daughter. When the princess came of age, she was promised in marriage to the prince of a faraway kingdom. Her mother packed many valuable vessels, trinkets and jewels for her journey, and assigned a chambermaid to accompany her to the palace of her bridegroom. They each also received a horse for the journey. The princess horse, named Falada, could speak. Mother and daughter sorrowfully took leave of each other, and the princess and chambermaid set forth.

After a while, the princess felt thirsty and asked her chambermaid to bring her some water from the brook. But the chambermaid refused to serve her, and the princess had to dismount and fetch her drinking water herself. It was a warm, sunny day, and after riding for a few miles, the princess grew thirsty once more. But when she requested her chambermaid to fetch her a drink, she refused again. Weeping, the princess bent over a stream and drank some water. When she returned to the horses, the chambermaid, who had grown bolder, forced the princess to exchange her royal robes for her own shabby clothes and claimed Falada as her own. She threatened the princess with dire consequences if she breathed a word of this to anyone, and they resumed their journey. Falada saw everything, and remembered it well.

When they arrived at the royal palace, there was a great celebration. The prince, falling for the chambermaid's disguise, took her as his bride. Fearful that Falada might betray her, she ordered that his head be cut off. The true princess, meanwhile, was given the task of helping Little Conrad, the boy who tended the geese. Every morning and evening, when she passed through a large gateway beneath which Falada's head was nailed, she spoke to her beloved steed.

Seeing this, Little Conrad told the king, who followed them one day. He observed the Goose Girl speaking to Falada, and also noticed her immense beauty and her hair of pure gold. When they returned to the palace, the king summoned the princess. She broke down and narrated the story of her journey, whereupon the king ordered that she be dressed in royal clothes, and the prince be told of her true identity. The chambermaid was banished in disgrace, and a great feast was prepared. The prince married his true bride and they lived happily ever after.

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