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Identification and Creation

Object Number
2014.361
People
Muhammad Baqir Samirumi
Title
Pen Box with Persian Women in Medallions
Classification
Artists' Tools
Work Type
pen box
Date
1909-1910
Places
Creation Place: Middle East, Iran, Isfahan
Period
Qajar period
Culture
Persian
Persistent Link
https://hvrd.art/o/351828

Physical Descriptions

Medium
Oil paint, gold-colored pigments, and lacquer on pasteboard
Dimensions
3.5 × 3.2 × 19.9 cm (1 3/8 × 1 1/4 × 7 13/16 in.)
Inscriptions and Marks
  • inscription: 303 Samīrumī 1327
    303 [Baqir] Samirumi 1909-10

Provenance

Recorded Ownership History
Ezzat-Malek Soudavar, Geneva, Switzerland (by 2014), by descent; to her son Abolala Soudavar, Houston, Texas (2014), gift; to Harvard Art Museums, 2014.

Note:
Ezzat-Malek Soudavar (1913-2014) formed this collection over a period of sixty years. She purchased the works of art on the international art market.

Acquisition and Rights

Credit Line
Harvard Art Museums/Arthur M. Sackler Museum, Gift of A. Soudavar in memory of his mother Ezzat-Malek Soudavar
Accession Year
2014
Object Number
2014.361
Division
Asian and Mediterranean Art
Contact
am_asianmediterranean@harvard.edu
Permissions

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Descriptions

Description
Cover and sliding compartment with rounded ends. The top is decorated in vertical format with three cartouches. In the center is a full-length portrait of an Iranian woman in a black jacket and floor-length skirt; above and below are bust-length female portraits. The sides are composed in a similar manner with an oblong cartouche in the center that features animals in a mountainous landscape; to the right and left are small riverine landscapes. On the base an arabesque is painted in gold on a black background.
The artist Muhammad Baqir Samirumi sometimes added the number 303 to his signature. It has been suggested that this stands for the name “Baqir,” the letters of which have this numerical value.

Publication History

  • Basil William Robinson, Qajar Lacquer, Muqarnas (1988), vol. VI, pp. 131-146, fig. 17
  • Massumeh Farhad and Mary McWilliams, ed., A Collector’s Passion: Ezzat-Malek Soudavar and Persian Lacquer, Harvard Art Museums and Freer/Sackler Galleries, Smithsonian Institution (Cambridge, MA/Washington, D.C., 2017), p. 158, cat. 180
  • David Roxburgh and Mary McWilliams, ed., Technologies of the Image: Art in 19th-Century Iran, exh. cat., Harvard Art Museums (Cambridge, MA, 2017), pp. 156-157, cat. 77

Exhibition History

Verification Level

This record has been reviewed by the curatorial staff but may be incomplete. Our records are frequently revised and enhanced. For more information please contact the Division of Asian and Mediterranean Art at am_asianmediterranean@harvard.edu