Robert J. Del Bonta Collection
name: label: Creator
content: Del Bontà, Robert John
label: Former owner
content: Underwood & Underwood
label: Names
content: Picart, Bernard, 1673-1733
place: label: Place
content: India
label: Place
content: Shiva
label: Place
content: South Asia
label: Place
content: India -- Goa
label: Place
content: Calcutta (India)
label: Place
content: Sri Lanka
topic: label: Topic
content: Fakirs -- India
label: Topic
content: Hinduism
label: Topic
content: Voyages and travels
label: Topic
content: Ethnography -- South Asia
label: Topic
content: Mughal Empire
label: Topic
content: Religion
label: Topic
content: Buddhist temples
label: Topic
content: Cave temples
label: Topic
content: Mosques
label: Topic
content: Buddhas
label: Topic
content: Buddhism
creator: label: Creator
content: Del Bontà, Robert John
setName: label: See more items in
content: Robert J. Del Bonta Collection
bioghist: label: Biographical / Historical
content: Dr. Robert J. Del Bontà was born in 1949. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Michigan in 1978. From 1993 to 2000 he was a research associate and guest curator at the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco. He also curated major exhibitions for the Berkeley Art Museum; the University of Michigan Museum of Art; the Portland Art Museum; and the New Orleans Museum of Art. He writes and lectures on a wide range of subjects relating to South Asian art including paintings, prints, photographs, popular art, sculptures, and architecture. More recently, he also writes about European prints pertaining to Europe's perception of India and Indo-Portuguese art.

Del Bontà began to collect prints related to South Asia while completing his doctorate in South Asian art history at the University of Michigan in the 1970s.  The Robert J. Del Bontà collection contains prints and books depicting people, cultures, religious customs, gods and goddesses, and architecture of Asia, with a specific emphasis on South Asian art.
physdesc: label: Extent
content: 12 Linear feet
unitdate: label: Date
content: Circa 1500-1900
custodhist: label: Custodial History
content: Gift of Robert J. Del Bonta, 2014-2019, 2021
dataSource: label: Archival Repository
content: Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery Archives
identifier: label: Identifier
content: FSA.A2014.06
objectType: label: Type
content: Collection descriptions
label: Type
content: Archival materials
label: Type
content: Prints
label: Type
content: Stereographs
label: Type
content: Engravings
arrangement: label: Arrangement
content: The collection is arranged into seven series, beginning with the initial gift in support of the 2014 exhibition, Strange and Wondrous: Prints of India from the Robert J. Del Bontà Collection.  Each series represents a grouping selected by the donor and follows the donor's original curation of the material. E or engraving numbers reflect the donor's numbering system.

Series 1: Original gift supporting the exhibition, Strange and Wondrous: Prints of India from the Robert J. Del Bontà Collection in 2014 focusing on ascetics and mendicants. 
Series 2: Prints and Engravings relating to the rulers including Timurid and Mughal rulers
Series 3: 16th-17th century prints 
Series 4: Engravings and prints from around the world
Series 5: English engravings depicting India
Series 6: Dutch and French engravings of voyages across the world 
Series 7: French engravings depicting monuments of India
bibliography: label: Bibliography
content: Calendar Prints: Popular Devotional Art of India, slide set No. 52, American Committee for South Asian Art Color Slide Project, Ann Arbor:  University of Michigan, 1984.

"Early European Engravings on Indian Themes," CSMVS Research Journal 2016, Saryu Doshi, hon. ed., Bombay: Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya (formally the Prince of Wales Museum of Western India), pp. 72-83.

"Engraving Eastern Discoveries," Treasure Ships: Art in the Age of Spices, James Bennett and Russell Kelty, eds., Adelaide: Art Gallery of South Australia, 2015, pp. 106-13, 323, and 325-26.

"Engraving India in 17th and 18th-century Europe," Art in Print, Vol. 4, no. 4 (November-December 2014), pp. 22-27.

"From Herodotus onwards: Descriptions of un-identified Jainas," for Jaina Law and Society, published by the Centre of Jaina Studies, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, forthcoming.

"Looking at India, up close and from afar," Treasures, the Members magazine of the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco, Vol. II, No. 2, Fall 1998, pp. 6-8.

"M. Abbayi: Krishna und Yashoda" catalogue entry, Die Sixtinische Madonna: Raffaels Kultbild wird 500, Andreas Henning, ed., Dresden: Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden and München: Prestel, 2012, cat. No. 139, p. 293.
genre_format: label: Genre/Form
content: Prints
label: Genre/Form
content: Stereographs
label: Genre/Form
content: Engravings
scopecontent: label: Scope and Contents
content: The collection primarily contains prints, engravings, and books. The majority of the collection highlights the Indian subcontinent from the 16th to the 20th centuries through the lens of Europeans. It contains depiction of the subcontinent's peoples, cultures, monuments, religious sites, and religious practices as seen in Dutch, English, French, German, and Italian publications. Among this collection are also some representations of people from other parts of the world.