Published Catalogue Text: In Harmony: The Norma Jean Calderwood Collection of Islamic Art , written 2013
54
Mirror-case cover with mother, child, and angel
Iran, Qajar period, 19th century
Opaque and semi-opaque watercolor on prepared pasteboard under shellac varnish
12.3 × 10 cm (4 13/16 × 3 15/16 in.)
2002.50.107
The outer surface of this mirror-case cover, like that of cat. 53, features a rose-and- nightingale theme. Here the bulbul appears among flowers—roses and hydrangeas—against a reddish-brown ground enclosed by a ruled border. At the top right, above the hydrangeas, a small inscription in white nastaʿ līq reads yā Imām Ḥasan (O Imam Hasan), invoking the second Shiʿi Imam, son of ʿAli ibn Abi Talib and Fatima. The presence of this text suggests that a related theme, such as a devotional image of ʿAli and his sons Hasan and Husayn, will be found on the inner surface of the lid, so what actually appears there delivers a surprise: a grouping, derived from Christian sources, of a mother, her child, and an angel in a landscape setting. The Qajar rendition of this scene conflates the iconography of the Annunciation, where the angel Gabriel, bearing a lily, appears before the Virgin Mary, with that of Mary holding the infant Jesus, from whose head radiates a subtle halo. Although Mary’s red and blue clothing follows the standard color convention, she is dressed as a modern, bejeweled European lady. In a form of immodest modesty, the bodice of her dress is cut so low that it exposes her breasts, which are barely concealed by a diaphanous silky covering. The
same gauzy fabric makes up her long but revealing sleeves.
The painting technique of this scene differs from that of the outer surface: here the underlying ivory-colored pasteboard is not completely covered with pigment. Rather, washes of bright paint dominated by red, blue, green, and gold, as well as extremely fine stippling, are applied to the paper, producing an effect that resembles ceramic glazing. The tinted monochrome palette of the landscape is typical of Qajar lacquer objects that, in adopting subject matter from European prints, mimic the effects of engraving.
The treatment of Mary’s bosom is reminiscent of the fusion of profane and Christian subjects developed in Mughal painting during the reign of Akbar (1556–1605) and fostered by his son and successor Jahangir (r. 1605–27).1 The eroticized image of the European woman, common in Qajar art, represents an appropriation of various European sources mediated through Indian artworks.[2]
David J. Roxburgh
[1] See Findly 1993, 66–86.
[2] Traffic of artists and their art between the royal courts of India and Iran was brisk from the mid-1500s onward. For the Mughal use of European images, see Bailey 1998. On the erotic image in Qajar art, see Najmabadi 1998, 76–89.
