Indian paintings often depict a complete world, a world constructed rather than depicted realistically and sometimes a completely imaginary one. Divided thematically into religious, romantic, musical, and courtly subjects, the paintings in this book provide glimpses into some of the many worlds painted by Rajput and Mughal artists in the sixteenth to nineteenth centuries.

Pleasure Gardens of the Mind documents an exhibition at the Los Angeles Couuty Museum of Art chosen from the collection of Jane Greenough Green to demonstrate some of the richness and stylistic variety of the Indian pictorial tradition. The book begins with a brief overview of Indian painting, followed by the four thematic groupings.

Sectional introductions discuss the nature of religious paintings, pictures of human and divine lovers, musical modes given visible form, and the painted worlds of courtiers and kings. Individual entries describe the subject and style and discuss the dates and locations of each painting's production.

Rather than merely presenting a chronology of styles or schools, the book's thematic organization assists in understanding subjects unique in Indian art as well as how subjects found in many painting traditions, such as pictures of animals, were expressed in various Indian schools.