TWO ARCHAISTIC SAFAVID-REVIVAL PORTRAITS
PROPERTY FROM AN IMPORTANT EUROPEAN PRIVATE COLLECTION
Iran, late 19th - mid 20th century

Opaque pigments, ink, pencil, white wash and gold on paper, comprising a large Safavid-revival vertical portrait of a standing maiden wearing a densely ornate gold robe decorated with Chinese-inspired motifs like ru clouds and spiralling lotus flower sprays, with a long gold-embroidered white veil covering her head and back, her sinuous and slender figure painted in a manner and posture reminiscent of Reza Abbasi and 17th-century Isfahani school drawings, the portrait encased within two concentric decorative borders, the first inspired by Safavid manuscript illuminations with interlocking gilt lotus flowers and split palmette trellis against a cobalt blue ground, the latter with a variety of figural scenes with men in the wilderness, either conversing or hunting, either teaching or studying, signed in black ink at the bottom Mirza Aqa Naqqashi Isfahani Imami, further black ink calligraphic lines of poetry from Sonnet 260 of Hafez on the outer border, mounted, glazed and framed, 56.5cm x 46cm including the frame; and another Safavid-revival portrait imitating Safavid illustrated folios with a young, beardless ruler portrayed in the centre, a cobalt blue cartouche inscribed in gold below identifying him as Sultan Aqa Mohamad Khan Qajar, the background inspired by the interiors of 17th-century manuscript illustrations, set within concentric decorative borders decorated with arabesques, interlocking vegetal and rosette sprays, and cusped cartouches filled with typical topoi from Persian art and literature like Leyla and Majnun, reclining courtly ladies, moon-face youths, Chinese-inspired qilins and other wild animals, 42.4cm x 26.5cm.