Dora Tan
Head of Sale, Specialist
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PROPERTY FROM THE ASBJORN LUNDE FOUNDATION
Lot 312
A PORTRAIT OF A NOBLEMAN FROM A POLIER ALBUM PROVINCIAL MUGHAL, FAIZABAD OR LUCKNOW, CIRCA 1776
22 March 2022, 09:00 EDT
New YorkSold for US$7,650 inc. premium
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Mark Rasmussen
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A PORTRAIT OF A NOBLEMAN FROM A POLIER ALBUM
PROVINCIAL MUGHAL, FAIZABAD OR LUCKNOW, CIRCA 1776
Opaque watercolor, ink, and gold on paper; the painting (recto) and calligraphy page (verso) laid on an album page with painted floral borders; the recto lower border numbered, '30'.
Image: 8 1/2 x 4 5/8 in. (21.5 x 11.6 cm);
Folio: 15 1/2 x 11 1/4 in.(39.4 x 28.8 cm)
Opaque watercolor, ink, and gold on paper; the painting (recto) and calligraphy page (verso) laid on an album page with painted floral borders; the recto lower border numbered, '30'.
Image: 8 1/2 x 4 5/8 in. (21.5 x 11.6 cm);
Folio: 15 1/2 x 11 1/4 in.(39.4 x 28.8 cm)
Footnotes
Executed in the refined nim qalim ('half pen') style, this reserved portrait of an unknown courtier fits into the corpus of Mughal copies that Mihr Chand and his atelier produced for their patron, Antoine Louis Henri Polier (1741–95). For further discussion on the Polier albums, see lot 311 in this sale.
With the body incomplete and only the head finished, this work follows a genre of formal portraiture of Mughal officials and ministers found in the imperial ateliers of the 17th century. The well-defined structure of the sitter's ear and creased brow, along with his narrow, possibly tired eyes, may reflect the stress and intensity of life at court. Compare with closely related portraits of Islam Khan Rumi ascribed to Chitarman in the Johnson Collection at the British Library (Falk and Archer, Indian Miniatures in the India Office Library, 1981, p.412, no.107), and also in the British Museum (see Martin, The Miniature Paintings and Painters of Persia, India, and Turkey from the 8th-18th Century, 1912, nos.187A & B, and for others in the group nos.184-97), that may have served as inspiration for the present lot.
The verso's calligraphy page, with the last line of an unidentified poem copied by Mahmud ibn Ishaq al-Shahabi, is dated 981 (equivalent to 1573-4 CE). Mahmud ibn Ishaq al-Shihabi was a famous 16th-century calligrapher, mentioned in several literary sources as a great master of nasta'liq script. Bayani records him as the son of Khwajah Ishaq Shihabi Siyavashani, who was Mayor of Herat at the time of the capture of the city by the Uzbeks in 935 (1528-9 CE). He was taken to Bukhara together with his family and other artists, including the celebrated Mir 'Ali, who took on Mahmud as a pupil (Bayani, Ahval wa atar-i hwusniwisan, vol.3, 1969, pp.876-80; Minorsky, Calligraphers and Painters, 1959, p.131; Adamova and Bayani, Persian Painting, 2015, pp.421-3).
Provenance:
Collection of Asbjorn Lunde (1927-2017), New York, by 1988
(Probably acquired from Maggs Bros. Ltd., London, 23 February 1967)