As the killing of Hiranyakashipu happened before the garlanding of Narasimhadeva by Prahlad Maharaj, why are both depicted in the same picture?

From: Kulasekhar Das

In our famous Nrsimha picture, we see Pralhad Maharaj offering garland to Lord even at the time the Lord is still holding Hiranyakashypu on his lap. Actually we hear / read that Pralhad M. offered garland much later. (correct if this is wrong) Then how in the picture Pralhad maharaj is shown offering the garland at that time itself ?

Q. In our famous Narsimha picture, we see Prahlad Maharaj offering garland to the Lord. Even at that time, the Lord is still holding Hiranyakashipu on his lap. Actually, we hear that Prahlad Maharaj offered the garland much later.
Correct me if this is wrong. Then how in the picture Prahlad Maharaj is shown offering the garland at that time itself? A. The Prahlad Narsimhadev vast time is told in various Puranas and some of the details embellish, embellish means add to the Srimad Bhagavatam narrative and some of the details in some of the Puranas, like say the Narsimha Purana, the Padma Purana, where the same story comes along. But they refer to other Kalpas when Narsimhadev had appeared and they tell that vast time.
So the Puranas are describing the revelation of the vast times of the Lord as those vast times were revealed in the hearts of the great souls and they spoke it. So they did not refer to this particular Kalpa in which we are living. That’s why there are some slightly different narrations of these vast times.
So some of the Acharyas describe that after Lord Narsimhadev killed Hrithikashipu, he actually took his body and with the body went and sat on the throne. So the idea was that although Hrithikashipu was a demon, at two levels he was still in one sense dear to Lord Narsimhadev. At one level he knew that this is actually his own associate Jai who has taken the role of a demon because of the curse of the Kumaras.
At another level he also knew that this Lord, this is the person through whom my beloved devotee Prahlad was born in the world. So how wonderful is it that this Prahlad is born from this person. And when he took the garland of intestines and put it around his neck, he actually went and touched the intestine because he was thinking that Prahlad is such a great devotee, so is there any other great devotee like Prahlad in the body of this person? So he was touching and feeling the intestine to see if there was another Prahlad in that intestine who would also be a devotee like Prahlad.
The Lord could expand his loving relationship. And when he found that there was no other Prahlad inside that intestine, he thought, nonetheless, it is through this intestine that my great devotee Prahlad has appeared. Therefore, even this intestine is dear to me.
And so I will make this intestine as the garland around my neck. Because just as the devotees offer me a garland, so this is also a garland because this is connected with my devotee. It is through this that the devotee appeared in the world.
So that is why the pastime can be seen at one level as an expression of Lord Narsimhadev’s anger with Hiranyakashipu. So in this understanding of the pastime, which is at a higher level of seeing the loving reciprocation that is happening over there, Hiranyakashipu’s body was taken by Narsimhadev when he sat on the throne. And at that time, Prahlad Maharaj came along and he offered his garland.
Prahlad Maharaj is garlanding the Lord while Hiranyakashipu is on the lap of the Lord. Now of course, when we have pictorial representations, they depict the essential theme, but not all the essential details need to be literally accurate. There is nothing thematically or philosophically incorrect in the pictorial depictions that are made by Sri Prabhupada.
There can be situations when the devotees do things in a way that is more devotionally apt than it is literalistically accurate. For example, when we made the Ugra Narsimha deity in Mayapur, according to proportions, Narsimhadev was huge in size. It was described that his hair on the head, his mane was scattering away the clouds.
Similarly, when we make the Shilpakar, the sculptor who was going to fashion the deities, we have to have Prahlad according to sizes as described in the Shilpahastras. Then Narsimhadev will have to be literally a few feet tall for us to have Prahlad of a size that is visible enough to worship. We have to have Narsimhadev of the size that we have presently, copically small, because that was the proportion of the sizes between the two.
So of course, the Lord can decrease his size so that he can reciprocate love with his devotees. Essentially, the sizes were hugely different. Then, at the request of the senior devotees and the Shilpakar, after consulting in his tradition, proportions are important, but at the same time, considering the devotional aspect, the deities can be made according to the proportions that are realistically practical to serve.
Prahlad Maharaj is so small that we can’t even see him. Then how can we serve him by worshipping him? Narsimhadev is so giant that we can’t dress him, we can’t even take proper darshan of him. Then how can the service happen? So the principle is how we can serve him best.
Even if somebody argues that there is no such scene, killed at the same time as Prahlad Maharaj’s car landing, devotionally, these three are the most important characters in the pastime. The Lord is there, his devotees are there and the demon is there. And in the Lord descends.
So, this theme of how the initial message of the pastime is captured in this picture and that’s why it is realistically accurate. Still, not just appropriate, but it is hard to summarize. Firstly, I said that there are other versions of the story where the body is still on the lap of Narsimhadev when Prahlad comes to Karnalanda, that were not so accurately said.