George Bogle (1746-81) was an employee of the East India Company who on 13 May 1774 was appointed by Warren Hastings as envoy to Tibet. Bogle and his companion Alexander Hamilton arrived in Tibet in 8 November 1774 and met Lobsang Palden Yeshe, 6th Panchen Lama (1738-80) at Deshi-rib-gyal, a small palace in southern Tibet where he was staying to avoid the risk of smallpox at the capital, Shigatse. They were back in Calcutta by summer 1775; their visit is described in Bogle’s journal (first published in 1876 and reprinted in 2010 by Cambridge University Press, ed. C R Markham). Presumably Bogle also described his embassy to Tilly Kettle, an English artist working in Calcutta at this time from which he created this painting of the first audience of the first British Embassy to Tibet.

The Lama, seated cross-legged on a dais, is being presented with a Tibetan ceremonial scarf or 'khata' by an attendant; two further attendants, his physician and cup-bearer stand either side of him. To the left George Bogle stands in Tibetan costume beside two cross-legged men. The walls are hung with silk pictures and a window opens on to a mountainous landscape with a red and gold building. Many of the details are necessarily fanciful, departing from Bogle’s more detailed description; the artist instead seems to wish to convey the general mood of an affable encounter in which the British visitor adapts to the customs of his hosts. The fact that he alone is set against the window may be intended to suggest that he comes from over those mountains.