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The Jina Parsvanatha Sculpture: A Study in Symbolism

November 28, 2012

Josheen Oberoi briefly explores the signs and meanings embedded in ancient Indian Jina sculptures

New York: Jainism, one of the oldest faiths in India, is defined by its commitment to non-violence and a self-directed effort to attain enlightenment. The ‘Supreme Beings’ who achieve this state of liberation and assist others in the process are called Jinas (victors) or Tirthankaras. There are said to have been twenty four Jinas in Jainism, the last of whom, Vardhamana Mahavira, is possibly the most widely known among non practitioners of Jainism.

However, when it comes to the arts and representation in Jainism there is a rich history of sculptures of many of the Jinas, replete with symbolism relating to their positions, accompanying objects, and their meaning.

Jina Parsvanatha
Object: Sculpture
Place of origin: Garsoppa, India (probably, made)
Date: 12th century (made)
Materials and Techniques: Black shale
Museum number: 931(IS)
Image courtesy: Victoria and Albert Museum

Two similar sculptures from different time periods are wonderful examples of Jina Parsvanathas and their symbolism. This beautiful 12th century sculpture (on the left) from the Victoria and Albert Museum collection in London represents the twenty third Jina Parsvanatha, who is revered as a great teacher and is one of four Jinas most often portrayed in Jain art. A similar sculpture in the ongoing Indian Antiquities auction conducted by Collectibles Antiques India and powered by Saffronart is from the 11th century, created during the rule of the Hoysala Dynasty. It is a distinctive work from a time period rarely seen in private hands; most works from this Dynasty are in museums or preserved at heritage sites.

Parsvanatha lived in the 8th century BC. He was the son of King Ashvasena and Queen Vamanadevi of Varanasi who renounced the world at the age of thirty to become an ascetic. He attained absolute knowledge and became the twenty-third Tirthankara or Jina in Jainism and is associated with the color blue and a seven hooded serpent.

The Jina fact file on the Victoria & Albert Museum website allows us as viewers to read the sculpture as well. Jinas are always shown in either a padmasana (seated) or kayotsarga (standing) position. The two Jina Parsvanathas in discussion here are standing; the immobility and discipline required is considered a form of severe penance and asceticism.

Jina Parsvanatha
Greenish Schist
11th Century
Hoysala Dynasty
Karnataka
Height: 51 in (129.5 cm)
Image courtesy: Saffronart Indian Antiquities Auction (Nov 28-29, 2012), Lot 3

The three tiered umbrella at the top of the sculpture is a symbol of the Jina’s spiritual sovereignty, while the seven headed snake, Dharanendra, protects the Jina with his coils and a canopy over his head. Jinas, like those in these two sculptures, are the only Jain figures shown unclothed as a sign of their absolute enlightenment and rejection of all materialism. They are often flanked by guardian spirits called yakshas and yakshis, positioned in these sculptures by the feet of the Jina.

The strength of the physical body and the powerful features in the sculpture above is distinctive of the Hoysala Dynasty, which oversaw great developments in architecture and classically modeled sculptures during its rule.

You can hear some interesting ideas about the importance of the seven hooded serpent and the significance of the standing position in context of the Jina Parsvanatha in the collection of the V&A Museum here.

Hanging Fire: Contemporary Art from Pakistan

November 7, 2012

Josheen Oberoi revisits the seminal 2009 exhibition Hanging Fire at Asia Society, New York

New York: Asia Society, the premier global institution promoting understanding between Asia and the United States, held the first museum survey exhibition of contemporary Pakistani art in the United States at their flagship space in New York in 2009. Curated by the renowned writer and curator Salima Hashmi, the exhibition Hanging Fire was a study on the vibrancy and multiplicity of praxis of contemporary artists in Pakistan.

On the occasion of Saffronart’s inaugural auction of Art of Pakistan, starting today, I retrace my steps to a piece I had originally penned for the Saffronart website in 2009. The show included the work of fifteen Pakistani artists in diverse media, many of who are part of the upcoming auction. As a survey exhibition of contemporary artists and art practices in the country, the exhibition served to undermine the monolithic perspective of Pakistan and its art that often still dominates the news media. The artists in the exhibition addressed contemporary concerns ranging from the personal and local to the regional and global, thus offering a glimpse into the active internal dialogues that animate Pakistan. What follows is a brief survey of what I saw.

Hamra Abbas
Ride 2
2008
Painted fiberglass and wood
Approx. H. 72 x W. 39 x L. 94 in.
Image courtesy of the artist and Green Cardamom
Image source: http://www.asiasociety.org
From the exhibition – Hanging Fire: Contemporary Art from Pakistan, Asia Society, New York, 2009-10

Amongst the works on display was Hamra Abbas‘s Ride 2, 2008, an electric-pink fiberglass sculpture of Buraq (a mythic winged creature – half woman, half horse) believed to be Prophet Mohammad’s holy mare. A popular motif in Pakistan, it is often illustrated in classical narratives. However, it was the folk representation of the Buraq that Abbas reproduced in this life-size work, that claims the religious icon within a female narrative, and, through it, signifies both power and freedom.

Naiza Khan
Spine
2008
Galvanized steel and suede leather
H. 26 x W. 12 5/8 x D. 6 3/8 in. (66 x 32 x 16 cm)
Image courtesy of Mahmood Ali
Image source: http://www.asiasociety.org
From the exhibition – Hanging Fire: Contemporary Art from Pakistan, Asia Society, New York, 2009-10

Adeela Suleman and Naiza Khan’s works also evoked questions of identity and of the politics of the body. Naiza Khan’s sculpture Spine, 2008, for instance was a corset-like cage made of galvanized steel with red suede stitched over it. The sculpture appeared to be an armour-like trap encompassing and protecting the body, but was also seductive in the choice, colour and texture of the suede. Explaining her work, the artist says, “These objects occupy a place between love and war, and are ambiguous in their position of aggression and seduction.”

The sculptures by Adeela Suleman displayed in the exhibition were made of found domestic objects (tongs, jars, funnels and spoons) and physically resembled the structure of helmets worn by two-wheeler drivers in Pakistan. In Suleman’s works, objects associated with female-use are re-framed within a non-domestic setting, evoking questions of gender roles and boundaries. Also included in the exhibition were photographs of women wearing these object-helmets, bringing immediacy to the works by inserting the gendered self into them.

Mahreen Zuberi
Open Wide I
2008
Gouache on wasli
H. 9 5/8 x W. 12 5/16 in.
Image courtesy of the artist
Image source: http://www.asiasociety.org
From the exhibition – Hanging Fire: Contemporary Art from Pakistan, Asia Society, New York, 2009-10

Mahreen Zuberi showed six “austerely rendered vignettes” of the symbiotic relationship between pain and pleasure, executed in gouache on Wasli paper. Using the traditional miniature format, the artist presented images of objects that had the relationship of aggressor and victim. In one of the works, for example, disembodied hands holding dentist’s tools probe a similarly body-less mouth set on a flat negative space. This exploration of the human psyche using inanimate objects is a familiar trope for the artist as also seen in the work below from the upcoming Saffronart auction.

Mahreen Zuberi
Hysteria
2008
Gouache on Wasli
10.5 x 15.5 in
From: Saffronart’s 24 Hour auction: Art of Pakistan, Lot 68

Imran Qureshi
Moderate Enlightenment
2007
Gouache on Wasli
8.5 x 6.5 in
From: Saffronart’s 24 Hour Auction: Art of Pakistan, Lot 31
Exhibited and published: Hanging Fire: Contemporary Art from Pakistan, Asia Society, New York, 2009-10

Imran Qureshi’s works share the same medium and scale as Zuberi’s, but are deliberately sociopolitical in their intent. Working in the tradition of Mughal miniature portraits, Qureshi contemporarized the figures in his paintings. On the surface, their setting, background and garb appeared traditional, but the figures were depicted exercising with dumbbells or reading contemporary books; questioning stereotyping based on appearance. Qureshi had also installed a site-specific painting at the Asia Society for this exhibition. One of his important works in the current auction that was part of the Hanging Fire exhibition is on the right here.

Like Qureshi, Faiza Butt deals with the issue of stereotyping, but relates it to the recent, global increase in tension and fear. In two of her works on display at Asia Society (Get out of My Dreams, I and II, 2008), she presented noble young men in settings reminiscent of ‘Paradise’, staring out of the frame to meet the viewer’s gaze. A closer examination of the works, however, revealed that the figures are surrounded by symbols of modernity and technology like hairdryers, wine glasses, electric razors, and US currency, and that the young men themselves are bedecked with signifiers commonly linked to contemporary religious radicalism.

Faiza Butt
Get out of my dreams I
2008
Ink on polyester film
H. 24 x W. 19 in.
Image courtesy of the artist
Image source: http://www.asiasociety.org
From the exhibition – Hanging Fire: Contemporary Art from Pakistan, Asia Society, New York, 2009-10

Huma Mulji
High Rise: Lake City Drive
2009
Taxidermic buffalo, sheet metal, fiberglass, henna, and Duco paint
H. 137 7/8 x W. 82 7/8 x D. 26 7/8 in.
Image courtesy of the artist
Image source: http://www.asiasociety.org
From the exhibition – Hanging Fire: Contemporary Art from Pakistan, Asia Society, New York, 2009-10

Two of the other artists, Huma Mulji and Asma Mundrawala, dealt with the specific concerns of urban-rural relationships and the changing landscape of Pakistan, albeit in divergent ways. Mulji’s installation (High Rise: Lake City Drive, 2009) – a vulnerable looking taxidermic buffalo placed on a high Greek column – confronted the question of progress as defined by changing economies and the uneasy relationship between urban and rural Pakistan.

Mundrawala confined her work to the context of Karachi and the effects of modernization on its landscape and culture. Her works included pop-up books and a video installation, which re-imagined nostalgic scenes from moments of popular culture. Using photographs of people she didn’t personally know from her family albums, she reinvented idyllic Karachi scenes that did not necessarily exist anymore, “recreating an unsatisfactory world by furnishing it with imagined alternatives”.

A reimagining of oppositions was also seen in Rashid Rana’s photographic montages. In Red Carpet I, 2007, he created an elaborate, vibrant mosaic of a Balochi carpet using images from Pakistani slaughter houses as its minute, bloody components, making his concerns with duality and contradiction explicit. Ayaz Jokhio’s drawings also emphasized the visual impact of physical forms and the incongruity of their different functions. In Diptych No 1, 2008, the image of a pen was juxtaposed with an enlarged drawing of a bullet, startling the viewer with both their visual similarities and the sharp divergence of their functions.

Rashid Rana
Red Carpet 1
2007
Edition 1/5; C-print + DIASEC
H. 95 x W. 135 in.
Image courtesy of Gallery Chemould and Chattertjee & Lal Mumbai
Image source: http://www.asiasociety.org
From the exhibition – Hanging Fire: Contemporary Art from Pakistan, Asia Society, New York, 2009-10

Bani Abidi’s ironic video titled Shah Pipe Band Learns The Star Spangled Banner, 2004, followed a brass pipe band in Lahore hired by the artist to learn the Star Spangled Banner (the American national anthem). Through this work, the artist captured the anxiety of the uncertain times in Pakistan, and the country’s ambiguous relationship with the West. The futility of the exercise of learning the tune and the irony of it underlined this sentiment for the artist.

Ali Raza
Throne II
2008
Burnt paper collage and acrylic on canvas
H. 72 x W. 48 in.
Image courtesy of the artist
Image source: http://www.asiasociety.org
From the exhibition – Hanging Fire: Contemporary Art from Pakistan, Asia Society, New York, 2009-10

Also on display were Anwar Saeed’s explicit illustrations in the book, I Pierre Seel, Deported Homosexual, a true story of a boy imprisoned in a Nazi concentration camp for being homosexual. By rendering these images, fantastical and sexual in form, the written story of pain and humiliation was made personal by the artist.

Like Saeed, Ali Raza also used text, but as raw material for his paintings. He burned advertisements and used the ash to create collages with acrylic paint, commenting on the issues of censorship and corruption that continue to confront Pakistani society on a daily basis.

Importantly, paintings by Zahoor ul Akhlaq, who died in 1999, were also part of this exhibition. An important figure amongst Pakistani artists, he revived the techniques of miniature painting, and encouraged students to innovate with subject matter. This teaching is evident in one of his works that was on display, the triptych A Visit to the Inner Sanctum 1-3, 1997, which although in the style of miniature painting was abstract in content and form.

This exhibition represented the range and vitality of contemporary Pakistani art, in terms of medium as well as content. The exhibition, not being too far in the past, is also a significant marker in the continuing practices of these and many other artists living and working in Pakistan.

An interview with Adeela Suleman

October 28, 2012

Josheen Oberoi of Saffronart speaks with Adeela Suleman about the trajectory of her art practice

New York: On November 7-8 next week, Saffronart will have it’s inaugural sale of Art of Pakistan. This is a curated selection of modern and contemporary art by established and emerging artists.

An important contemporary artist featured in this auction (including two of her works) is Adeela Suleman. She was born in Karachi, Pakistan and studied Sculpture at the Indus Valley School of Art (1999). Prior to that she completed a Master’s degree in International Relations from The University of Karachi (1995). Suleman has participated in group and solo exhibitions worldwide, including at Gallery Rohtas 2, Lahore, in 2008; Canvas Gallery, Karachi, in 2008; Aicon Gallery, New York, in 2008, 2009, 2010 and 2011; International Exhibition of Contemporary Art, Bologna, in 2008; and Hanging Fire: Contemporary Art from Pakistan at the Asia Society Museum, New York, in 2009-10.

Adeela Suleman
Untitled, 2008
Powder coated and enamel painted steel cooking utensil, steel spoon and cycle ornament, with foam and cloth
Image courtesy: Saffronart 24 Hour Auction: Art of Pakistan (Nov 07-08, 2012)
For more details: http://www.saffronart.com/auctions/PreCatalog.aspx?eid=3487

Her body of work has consistently reflected a deep engagement with political, gender and societal concerns, an interest that was manifest in her years at the university as well. She has previously worked with found domestic objects made of metal, creating sculptures and body amours for women that beautify as much as cage the female figure (like in the work on the left) while her recent body of work sees a move towards a flatter silhouette in her sculptural work.

I had the pleasure of speaking to Adeela in 2010 during her solo show in New York at Aicon Gallery. Here I share with you my conversation with her about her work and the direction her art has taken.

Q: Your oeuvre has always had an underlying stream of social and political consciousness in it. Is that a deliberate choice on your part?

Adeela: I did my Masters in International Relations at the University of Karachi before my BFA and my experience at the university has been an influence in my work. The university was very politically charged and there was a great awareness and involvement amongst the student body. Even at that point, my college projects commented on such issues.

Q: Would you see yourself as an activist as well as an artist?

Adeela: I am not an activist. I am observing and acknowledging because one is aware of the surroundings, we don’t live in a bubble. I am not making a judgment on what should happen or not.

Q: There does appear to be a shift in the language you are using – from the steel utensils’ sculptures in the past few years to the works in your recent exhibition at Aicon Gallery in 2010, which have less volume. Could you talk about that?

Adeela:It has been a natural evolution for me. My college projects used to be about found objects, where I once made a tea fountain in a shrine. I then worked with motorcycles. The presence of utensils in my work came from using gadgets that made the life of women easier. So, I was making these objects my own. Now, I am using the skin of these objects to make the artwork. There is a loss of humor compared to earlier works because I am talking more of death in this suite of works.

Q: Is that also from a growing concern with the political situation in Pakistan and elsewhere in the world, the growing hostilities?

Adeela:Yes, you think about how we carry on with our daily activities when there is so much destruction around because it does not directly affect us. But there is always a tension between life and death, between what to do and not to do. The only thing certain seems to be death.

Q: Could you talk about the process in your recent suite of works After All its Always Somebody Else…?

Adeela:I wanted to use steel sheets like that used in mortuaries. Abdul Sattar Edhi, a great philanthropist started an ambulance network, where he would pick up unclaimed dead bodies, give them a bath and give them a dignified burial. This was on my mind when I started this suite of work. I do small drawings, put them on a computer and look for images I want to use, which are like found objects for me. Once I assemble the complete image, it is transferred to a larger scale and steel sheets are hammered to create them in three dimensions. I work with the craft people, because I am essentially a sculptor and see objects in three dimensions.

You can see more of Adeela’s works from this auction here and learn more about her practice here and here. You can also read  a New York Times review of her work here.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art: Galleries for the Art of the Arab Lands, Turkey, Iran, Central Asia, and Later South Asia – Part V

October 12, 2012

Josheen Oberoi of Saffronart explores the stunning new galleries of Islamic art at the Met, a few centuries at a time.

New York: This is the last in a series of posts that came out of my visit to the Islamic Art collection at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and a consequent conversation with Dr. Maryam Ekhtiar, an Associate Curator in the Department of Islamic Art there.  This art collection is presented in fifteen new galleries that opened to the public after an eight year renovation in November last year.

The galleries are titled Art of the Arab Lands, Turkey, Iran, Central Asia, and Later South Asia. Dr. Ekhtiar, in speaking of the nomenclature of the collections, said, “the name of the galleries speaks to the parameters of our collection, our department’s collection”.  Instead of the overarching phrase “Islamic Art” that suggests a monolithic construction of an Islamic culture; this title is in fact a clue to the physical and historical reconfiguration of these galleries, and a particularly apt one in these times of misleading narratives of Islam worldwide.

Through the course of my conversation with Dr. Ekhtiar we walked chronologically through the numbered galleries (Galleries 450 – 464) that are organized by geographical regions and time periods (from ca. 7th century AD through ca. 20th century). I have followed the same chronology here, bringing us today to the last two galleries 463 and 464 showing Mughal and later South Asian art.

Here’s the very useful museum map again, to help follow the information:

Floor Plan of New Galleries
Image courtesy: The Metropolitan Museum of Art

We haven’t discussed South Asia previously but the time period (16th – 20th centuries) that we will look at today is contemporary to the arts of Safavids and later Iran and the overlap and exchange of culture is visible in the artistic forms of the time as well. Gallery 463, for example, presents the arts of the Sultanate, Mughal and Deccan courts from about 1450 through the nineteenth century. This gallery contains an extensive selection of jeweled arts that were practiced in South Asia, including jade carving (which was highly prized in China and was part of a commercial exchange with it). But like in Gallery 462, the two object forms that immediately capture attention are the carpets and the illustrated manuscripts’ folios.

Carpet with Scrolling Vines and Blossoms
Object Name: Carpet
Date: ca. 1650
Geography: Northern India or Pakistan, Kashmir or Lahore
Image courtesy: The Metropolitan Museum of Art

The scrolling vegetal designs that we saw in last week’s post are visible in the image on the left as well. The carpet below, on the other hand, with a niche that nestles a flowering plant, appears to be designed vertically and possibly for hanging on the wall rather than laying on the ground.

Carpet with Niche and Flower Design
Object Name: Carpet
Date: mid-17th century
Geography: India or Pakistan, Kashmir or Lahore
Image courtesy: The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Interestingly, these styles remained active in the Iranian and South Asian regions. The early 20th century example below, from a Saffronart auction in March this year displays a combination of these design details – the visible Arabesque niche in the carpet is occupied by intricate and delicate flora and fauna, surrounded by a border.

“Akbar Hunting with Cheetahs”, Folio from an Akbarnama
Painting attributed to Manohar (active ca. 1582–1624)
Object Name: Illustrated album leaf
Date: ca. 1604
Geography: India
Image courtesy: The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Illustrated manuscripts, similarly, remained an active part of the region through the 20th century as indicated by the folios on display in this gallery and in Gallery 464. Akbar, considered the greatest Mughal rulers (r. 1556 – 1605), established royal ateliers and commissioned illustrated manuscripts, including the Akbarnama that was a chronicle of his reign.

His successors Jahangir (r. 1605-27) and Shah Jahan (r. 1628-58) continued this patronage,an example of which is the exquisite Padshahnama, or the Shah Jahan Album illustrated through the 1640s. These reigns saw a diversity of manuscript production that included Indian, Persian and European elements (like linear perspective and European motifs). A few of the folios shown below evidence this multitude of subjects like studies of animals, flora and fauna, portraiture,mythological narratives that were produced simultaneously at that time. It also underlines the development of a unique idiom within the South Asian region in the arts of the book both linking it to and distinguishing it from the Safavid and later Iran workshops.

“Rama Receives Sugriva and Jambavat, the Monkey and Bear Kings”, Folio from a Ramayana
Object Name: Folio from an illustrated manuscript
Reign: Akbar (1556–1605)
Date: ca. 1605
Geography: India
Image courtesy: The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Madonna and Child in a Domestic Interior
Painting by Manohar (active ca. 1582–1624)
Object Name: Illustrated single work
Date: early 17th century
Geography: India
Image courtesy: The Metropolitan Museum of Art

“Shah Jahan on a Terrace, Holding a Pendant Set With His Portrait”, Folio from the Shah Jahan Album
Painting by Chitarman (active ca. 1627–70)
Object Name: Album leaf
Reign: Shah Jahan (1628–58)
Date: recto: 1627–28; verso: ca. 1530–50
Geography: India
Image courtesy: The Metropolitan Museum of Art

“Black Buck”, Folio from the Shah Jahan Album
Painting attributed to Manohar (active ca. 1582–1624)
Object Name: Album leaf
Reign: Jahangir (1605–27), recto
Date: recto: ca. 1615-20; verso: ca. 1530–50
Geography: India
Image courtesy: The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Adventures of Hamza or the Hamzanama was another narrative commissioned by Akbar that recounted the stories of Hamza, an uncle of Prophet Mohammad.

“Misbah the Grocer Brings the Spy Parran to his House”, Folio from a Hamzanama (The Adventures of Hamza)
Attributed to Dasavanta
Artist: Attributed to Mithra
Object Name: Folio from an illustrated manuscript
Reign: Akbar (1556–1605)
Date: ca. 1570
Geography: India
Image courtesy: The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Both Galleries 463 and 464 also have folios from the Islamic Deccan courts and later 19th century court arts of the Jain, Rajput, Pahari and “Company” style paintings. These are placed in conjunction with the Islamic art galleries to  accurately represent the continuum of South Asian art, not compartmentalized by religion. There was a rich dialog between the two contemporaneous traditions that is visible throughout these galleries.

For example, the image below on the left, of a nobleman on a terrace is an 18th century folio from a late Islamic Mughal center in Bengal, and on display in these galleries. The image on the right, from a Saffronart auction in April this year is the portrait of a Hindu Bikaneri maharaja. Such cross currents in portraiture, amongst other subjects, is a constant in these artistic traditions.

Portrait of a Maharaja
Late 17th Century
Bikaner School

Nobleman on a Terrace
Object Name: Illustrated single work
Date: ca. 1780
Geography: India, Murshidabad
Image courtesy: The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Ragamala paintings, also available for viewing, are a pictorial narrative mode for musical notes (ragas) that originated in the Islamic Deccan kingdoms but found their way to the ateliers of princely states in Rajasthan.

And finally, the “Company” school paintings, shown in Gallery 464 often documented the flora, fauna, topography and people of the land. These watercolors were commissioned by the British and executed by Indian painters in a European style.

Chronologically the last space in the newly configured galleries that we have been visiting over the last few posts, Gallery 464 can also be physically entered and understood independent of the remaining galleries.However, that is true of any of the fifteen galleries. Choosing your personal path through these spaces engenders a distinct experience each time.

Text (calligraphy), shapes (geometric, vegetal, figural, flora, fauna, zoomorphic), materials (ceramic, wood, metals, paper, textile), techniques (luster-painted, gilded, enameled, painted, carved), objects (utilitarian, luxurious,  decorative, religious) – these are just a few of the forms that can be conceptually and visually followed through these galleries. Recurring, in various ways, in various objects, they tell a story of a cultural continuum, not an overarching structure – this is a testament to the impeccably curated experience of these new galleries.

I hope you’ve enjoyed this ride with me. The Saffronart blog hopes to keep taking you along for more of these!

The Metropolitan Museum of Art: Galleries for the Art of the Arab Lands, Turkey, Iran, Central Asia, and Later South Asia – Part IV

October 8, 2012

Josheen Oberoi of Saffronart explores the stunning new galleries of Islamic art at the Met, a few centuries at a time.

New York: Last month I had started posting about the Islamic Art collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York that opened to the public after an eight year renovation in November last year. For those reading this series for the first time, here is a little introduction to these new galleries. Organized by geographical regions and time periods (from ca. 7th century AD through ca. 20th century), these fifteen new galleries (Galleries 450 – 464) present historically rigorous exhibits of arts that flourished under the aegis of Islamic rulers through many centuries. These galleries are also incredible in representing the diversity of mediums and contexts of these artistic practices.

In my last post, I had described the highlights of Galleries 459 through 461, that present the arts of the Ottoman Empire (ca 1299 – 1922), as shared with me by Dr. Maryam Ekhtiar, an Associate Curator in the Department of Islamic Art.  Here’s the very useful museum map again, to help follow the information:

Floor Plan of New Galleries
Image courtesy: The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Today, I look at Gallery 462 and its arts of Safavids and later Iran (from the 16th – 20th centuries). We have followed Iran from the 7th century onwards from Galleries 451, 453 and 455 and this gallery brings our understanding of art from the region almost to contemporary times. 

Iran was united and ruled by the Safavid dynasty from 1501  -1722.  Shah cAbbas who ruled from 1587–1629 was an important patron of the arts and this period saw an expansion and revival of production in arts for local consumption and commercial exchange with Europe. Ceramics in the style of Iznik pottery from Turkey that we saw in the last post and luster ware that has also been discussed previously were both encouraged extensively as is visible in the objects in this gallery.  But when you enter this space, there are a few works of art that dominate the conversation – the carpets and the illustrated manuscripts.

Persian Garden Carpet
Object Name: Carpet
Date: second half 18th century
Geography: Iran, Kurdistan
Image courtesy: The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Under Shah cAbbas, carpet weaving and textile production was transformed into a state industry, designed and produced in royal workshops at the new capital of Iran – Isfahan, in southern Iran. There are many different types and styles of carpets on exhibit here – medallion, garden, a possibly royal carpet, the “Polonaise” and carpets known as ‘Portuguese carpets’.

The Persian garden carpet or the char-bagh, (on the left)  represented a bird’s eye view of a traditional garden, which included water channels, fish swimming in these channels, birds and trees.

The “Seley Carpet” below, in style of a medallion carpet, is an exquisite example of the combination of medallion and vegetal motifs. These carpets centered around a medallion, similar to what appeared on book covers and texts, suggesting a cross pollination of designs between different art forms. These medallions were then surrounded by scrolling vegetal designs.

The Seley Carpet
Object Name: Carpet
Date: late 16th century
Geography: Iran
Image courtesy: The Metropolitan Museum of Art

This ‘Portuguese’ carpet below shows the central medallion with floral vines combined with explicit maritime scenes with ships sailed by Europeans in the four corners, possibly testifying to an active export and mercantile exchange between Europe and Iran at this time. Just these few examples of the pieces exhibited in this gallery showcase the complexity and diversity of carpet production in Iran at this time, especially under Shah cAbbas.

“Portuguese” Carpet with Maritime Scenes
Object Name: Carpet
Date: 17th century
Geography: Northeastern Iran, Khurasan
Image courtesy: The Metropolitan Museum of Art

“Rustam’s Fourth Course, He Cleaves a Witch”, Folio from the Shahnama (Book of Kings) of Shah Tahmasp
Abu’l Qasim Firdausi (935–1020)
Artist: Painting attributed to Qadimi (active ca. 1525–65)
Object Name: Folio from an illustrated manuscript
Reign: Shah Tahmasp (1524–76)
Date: ca. 1525
Geography: Iran
Image courtesy: The Metropolitan Museum of Art

The other highlight in Gallery 462 are the intricate folios of the Shahnama or “Book of Kings”. This is one of the great treasures from the rule of Shah Tahmasp (r. 1524 – 1576)  the second ruler of the Safavid dynasty. It was commissioned and made in the royal workshop. The Shahnama is a Persian national epic based on an oral tradition that dates back to pre-Islamic times and was versified by Firdausi in the early 11th century. It contains within many Zoroastrian threads with the ideas of polarities, of good and bad – an illustration also intended as education to the rulers and princes. This particular manuscript of the Shahnama is the most luxurious Persian manuscript ever produced and the best artists were employed by the royal workshop – painters, calligraphers, binders, illuminators with two generations of artists working on these manuscripts. The Met has 78 illustrations out of a total of 258 illustrated folios, presenting epic love scenes, battles of fantastical creatures with humans or among animals. There are multiple folios on display at any time in the gallery, with seating available to engage with them at leisure.

If you visit please do set aside some time for these folios. They are intimate in size but so detailed and beautifully rendered. I find myself noticing new details in them with each successive visit.  I have also been linking the title of each work (immediately under the image) to it’s individual museum page. This allows you to zoom in and look at enlarged sections clearly. If you cannot visit the museum, I would recommend using this feature to do the images justice, especially for today’s post.

Next week, in the last post in this series, we will visit the remaining two (out of fifteen) galleries, showcasing Mughal and later South Asian art. Stay tuned!