The Great Exhibition: India No. 7, 1852

Joseph Nash's print depicts a section of the Great Exhibition display on India. The Exhibition, which opened in Hyde Park in the purpose-built Crystal Palace in 1851, was the first international exhibition ever held and embraced productions at home and abroad. Here, visitors on two levels are perusing the exhibits.

Contemporary reactions to the exhibits were mixed. In 'History and Description of the Crystal Palace', John Tallis maligned the 'tributes' sent to the Exhibition from India as examples of 'wasteful and ridiculous excess.' By contrast, the author of 'The Industry of Nations, as exemplified in the Great Exhibition' praised the Indian productions as being 'of a rare and gorgeous, and also of a useful and instructive kind'.

The stuffed elephant supporting a howdah, seen here at the centre of Nash's print, proved to be a particular attraction for visitors.

Joseph Nash was an architectural painter and lithographer who was apprenticed to the architect Auguste Pugin. Nash accompanied Pugin on his travels to France and made lithographs of his master's drawings which were later published in 'Views Illustrative of the Examples of Gothic Architecture' (1830).