Proposal for Jodhpur Art Week

While going through Jodhpur’s history, I came across a name that really stayed with me Gulab Rai. She was one of Maharaja Vijay Singh’s Paswans (a royal companion, later called a concubine by the British). But Gulab Rai wasn’t just a companion she was a powerful woman who made her own mark in Jodhpur’s history. She commissioned beautiful spaces like Gulab Sagar, the Mahila Bagh Jhalra, and even had her own garden. This was a time when women followed the purdah system and didn’t go out in public. But they still managed to get things done through eunuchs, who were trusted members of their households. These eunuchs handled outside matters for the queens and royal women. With this support, women like Gulab Rai were able to collect wealth, make decisions, and hold real influence in royal affairs.

Sadly, when the British came in, they didn’t understand this system. They looked down on these women and the eunuchs, calling their way of life “barbaric.” Over time, their stories, respect, and even physical spaces like Gulab Rai’s garden started fading away.This loss of history, culture, and green spaces is what inspired my project. I want to make a series of glass arboretums that imagine what Gulab Rai’s garden might have looked like. These little glass worlds will hold delicate glass sculptures of local plants like the Fire Lily or Desert Caper that might’ve once bloomed in her orchard. Each arboretum will be about 25 cm wide and 1 to 1.5 feet tall, and I plan to make around 50 to 100 of them. They’ll feel like old specimen jars things we look at to remember what’s now gone. These works will not only reflect the lost gardens of Gulab Rai’s time, but also talk about how we’re losing green spaces today due to urban development.