- "Shah Jahan and Jahangir" By Balchand and Abu'l-Hasan. India 1628
- "Firdausi Encounters the Court Poets of Ghazna" Attributable to Aqa-Mirak. Page from a Shahnamah for Shah Tahmasp. Iran, Tabriz. Circa 1532
- "Marks of Love" By Afzal al-Husayni. Iran, Isfahan. 1646
- "Two Shepherds in a Bucolic landscape" By 'Ali Quli Jabbahdar.
Iran. Circa 1675.
- "Pictoral Genealogy of Jahangir" India. 1620-1622
- "Floral Fantasy" India. Circa 1650
(This Article is dedicated to the Scholar-Painter Ambassador Abid
H. Safrani (1911-1984)
Prince Sadruddin Aga Khan has one of the finest private
collections of Islamic art in the world. The most striking
feature of this marvellous collection is the fact that it
required a mere thirty years to be put together. Obviously, the
Prince is an aesthete and connoisseur of art. However, he is
known to have relied upon scholarly advice from the noted Harvard
University Islamic art historian, Stuart Cary Welch. Professor
Welch who is curator of Islamic Art at Boston's Fogg Museum and
New York's Metropolitan Museum, and has long acknowledged Prince
Sadruddin's patronage and friendship, is quick to point out that
ultimately, the Prince made the final decisions.
During the 1950s, while the Prince attended Harvard University,
the appreciation of Islamic art had not approached its present
level of demand. Discerning dealers in New York offered him fine
and often rare examples of Islamic art. Gradually, the Prince
acquired from European dealers in Paris and Geneva, where he
still maintains a second home. He also bought from London dealers
and bid regularly at Sotheby's and Christie's auctions on both
sides of the Atlantic.
The Prince's Islamic art collection is comprehensive both in
Muslim chronology and geography. He is constantly striving to
strengthen his collection and upgrade its quality. Consequently,
to concentrate his attention upon Muslim aesthetics, he recently
sold his celebrated collection of African art. It would be
difficult to summarize the enormous scope of Prince Sadruddin's
collection. On the other hand, it is possible to stress the fact
that his collection is best represented by the Arab, the Ottoman
Turkish, the Safavid and Qajar Persian, the Mughal as well as
Indian nineteenth century "Company" painting and manuscripts.
Islamic decorative arts, ceramics and the minor arts, many of
which can be found in the Prince's collection, will not be dealt
with in this article.
Among the Arabs, calligraphy is the highest art-form. Muslims are
people of the book. The Quran (Koran), the Muslim scripture, is
the most revered Islamic text. So much so that even those Muslims
who are unable to read Arabic, which is the sole language of the
Quran, know a verse or two at least. Some Muslims, equally
untutored in Arabic, can recite the entire Quran and know it by
heart. The educated Muslims also share a similar interest in the
Quran. Royal members of the House of Saud, such as the late King
Feisal, knew the Quran, chapter and verse, and could recall any
portion of this holy book at will.
Two types of written calligraphy were preferred, Kufic and
cursive. Kufic, which originated from the town of Kufa in Iraq,
is geometric, with a distinct rigidness. Due to this physical
characteristic, Kufic is ideal for chapter headings, as well as
wall inscriptions on Muslim mosques and minarets. The cursive
script, the more popular of the two, still used in newspapers, is
precisely what the term implies, flowing and easily readable.
Basically, all other Islamic scripts are variations of the Kufic
and cursive, and all of them tend to be highly inventive and
frequently seem like a new style. In Muslim architecture and in
the Qurans, Muslims invariable used a combination of both the
Kufic and the cursive scripts. But the numerous styles derived
from the Kufic and cursive are utterly fascinating.
Prince Sadruddin possesses many copies of the Quran. Among all of
them, he has one Quranic page which is an outstanding example of
Islamic calligraphy. It dates from the early tenth century,
approximately three hundred years after Prophet Muhammad's death
in 632 A.D. As this page is from North Africa it is all the more
interesting, for it sheds light upon a region generally
considered late in the flowering of Islamic art. The lettering is
in gold, written in Kufic style, on a blue vellum, which is
extremely rare. It is believed to be one of several folios, now
housed in various collections, from a Quran presented to the
mosque in Mashhad by Caliph as-Mamum (A.D. 813-837).
Incidentally, a number of Qurans have been discovered recently in
Yemen, all of them dating to the early years of Islam. Even in
retrospect, this stunning sample from Prince Sadruddin's
collection is a small but significant indication that the Arabs
were diligent when it came to writing the word of Allah.
Furthermore, the Prince's Quranic page attests to the fact that
Muslims aspired to creating beauty within the confines of
calligraphy.
Turkish history spans several centuries. An adventurous people,
highly disciplined and efficient administrators, the Turks
terrorised and disrupted many people. Then, in the wake of
victory, they controlled vast territories that included portions
of Central Asia, Western Asia and eventually Egypt. Many of the
great empires can be traced to Turkish ethnic origins such as the
Mameluks, Timurids and Mughals. All of these people developed and
integrated singular styles in art which are best defined by their
dynastic names.
In 1453, when Constantinople fell to the Ottoman Turks, another
new era in Islamic art emerged. These Ottomans employed the most
adept and artistic calligraphers available. They commissioned
splendid illuminated Qurans and enhanced the standards of the
decorative arabesque. Above all, they developed the book into a
single flowing concept. As a result the bindings (of handsomely
hand-tooled leather) are as exciting as the pages themselves.
Prince Sadruddin has several examples of Ottoman calligraphies,
manuscripts and paintings. Turkish arts thrived under Ottoman
patronage. The thrills the Ottomans must have experienced at
seeing the art of the Islamic book evolve under their aegis, can
still be had from studying them. In fact, the Ottoman sultans
acquired works of art for illustrated manuscripts and paintings,
from all over the Muslim world - especially from Persia, and
cities such as Baghdad, Damascus and Cairo, renowned for their
skilled artisans and artists.
While the calligraphers were striving to produce their finest art
for the sultans, these Ottoman sovereigns, with their prodigious
concern for excellence, also turned to architecture. As a result,
there are distinct hints of architectural refinements in some of
the Ottoman paintings in Prince Sadruddin's collection, including
the portrait of Sultan Selim II and a portrait of an Ottoman
official. A cursory glance at Muslim paintings will indicate an
emphasis on headgear. A huge, tulip-shaped turban, favoured by
Ottomans, is one such distinctive headgear among those worn by
Muslims. It is a means of recognising the Turkish origin of the
wearer. Ottoman paintings reveal the foremost achievements of
Muslim portraiture west of the Tigris and the Euphrates. Those
intrigued by these works of art would do well to study the
Ottomans as they were painted in the West by Venetian painters
such as Bellini, and by later masters such as Johann Kopenski.
There is more pleasure to be derived once there is an
understanding of Islamic art, rather than merely considering it
an exotic aspect of world art.
There is no doubt that Prince Sadruddin's collection is
particularly strong in Persian art, while again, the emphasis is
on the art of calligraphy as applied to the Quran. The preference
for this geographical area should not be surprising when one
learns that Prince Sadruddin's ancestors came from Persia.
Despite the change in his family's fortunes and notwithstanding
contemporary politics, the Prince is warm-hearted towards Persia.
It is Persia that contributed to the renaissance of Islamic art,
and indeed, Persia is crucial to any discussion of Muslim
cultural heritage.
Before nineteenth century, Perisan Muslim arts are best seen in
ceramics. An exception to this is the Seljuk calligraphies (1055-1258), of which Prince Sadruddin
owns several eleventh century
example. The Seljuks are remembered for their arts, but Persia
was transformed after the Mongol conquest in the thirteenth
century. Despite this change the Il-Khans, who were descendants
of the Mongols, patronised the arts of the book. For all its
brief reign, this Il-Khanid age inspired generations of Persian
painters.
All the same, Persian pictorial art is generally conceived as
beginning under the aegis of the Timurids in the fifteenth
century. It is in great measure the genesis of Persian painting.
Moreover, subsequent painting in Persia and India is ultimately
studied from Timurid sources as well, and as far as Islamic
painting in Persia is concerned, the cities of Tabriz and Herat
enjoyed the same kind of prestige as Florence and Rome in
Renaissance Italy. Bihzad, for example, who is generally
considered among the greatest Muslim painters, lived in Herat.
Iran embraced the Shiite sect of Islam at the time of the Safavid
dynasty. The Sunni sect, which is larger, claims the majority of
Muslims. Whereas theological discussion is not pertinent here, it
is wise to remember that Prince Sadruddin, like his forebears, is
Shiite. He is the son of Aga Khan III (1877-1957). Prince Karim
the present Aga Khan, is Prince Sadruddin's nephew. The followers
of the Aga Khan are a celebrated group among all Muslims. They
are entrepreneurs with philanthropic interests who believe in the
Aga Khan and accept his spiritual leadership. The Aga Khan's
followers are based in Bombay, which has long served as their
headquarters. Although many live in metropolitan cities such as
Bombay, Karachi, Nairobi, Mombasa and Johannesburg, others are
scattered around the world. Most of them are prosperous, self-confident and hard-working
Muslims. These attributes represent a
positive element and should be given greater attention than the
lacunae of Islamic theology. In so far as Prince Sadruddin is
concerned, until recently he served as the United Nations High
Commissioner for Refugees and was nearly elected Secretary
General of the United Nations, following the tenure of Kurt
Waldheim. Such pragmatic achievements enable us to conceive the
picture of a Muslim aesthete who is also a man of action. It is
also possible, furthermore, to see Prince Sadruddin in the
context of past Muslim patrons of art. The Safavids of Persia are
a fine example.
Within the first generation, the Safavids (1502-1736) had
established themselves as powerful patrons of art, no different
from their Medici contemporaries in Renaissance Italy, the
Mughals in India and the Ming emperors in China. The Safavids
went so far as to accord calligraphers an esteemed position
similar to that of painters. Shah Tahmasp (1524-1576), one of the
most eminent Safavid patrons of painting, spent two decades in
order to attract the best painters to his court. Having done so,
he went ahead to inspire a stylistic harmony among his court
painters. Such a royal incentive to paint had far-reaching
consequences, some of which can be seen in Prince Sadruddin's
collection.
Generations of Persian painters and patrons considered the
"Shahnamah", the Persian epic by the poet Firdausi (933 -
ca.1020), as their biggest pictorial challenge. In Persia, the
"Shahnamah" held the sort of literary position that Homer's
"Odyssey" had among peoples of the northern Mediterranean. Prince
Sadruddin has two pages from a "Shahnamah" made for Shah Tahmasp.
On one page, attributed to the painter Aqa-Mirak, dated 1532,
there is a rendering of the poet Firdausi, "Firdausi Encounters
the Court Poets of Ghazna." On the second page, attributed to
Muzaffar Ali, painted 1530-1535, is the legendary hero Rustam
pursuing Akvan (the demon). Both these pages have been assigned
to Tabriz, one of the two great Persian cities noted for its
paintings.
However, Shah Tahmasp eventually lost interest in the arts while
still in power. Soon, the neglected painters departed for new
ateliers in Ottoman Turkey and Mughal India. There, at nearly
opposite ends of Safavid Persia, these gifted artists contributed
to the increased flowering of Islamic painting. This visual
excitement is also garnered from Prince Sadruddin's collection.
Meanwhile, Persian patronage acquired a democratic trend in the
final years of Shah Tahmasp. Shah Abbas I (1587-1629) and his
successors discovered this egalitarian growth in the demand for
inexpensive paintings. Besides the Shah and the aristocracy, the
new patrons included bourgeois elements as well as career
professionals such as soldiers. The physical form of drawings and
paintings became a single page rather than an entire manuscript
full of illustrations. No doubt some of these single page
paintings were meant to be subsequently bound in albums. At that
time this popular concept - of the single page painting and
drawing - appealed to patrons in India and Turkey as well. Images
in these low-priced paintings tended to be introverted. These
works of art also departed from the established tradition of
anonymity and, on occasion, were signed. Gradually, Western
painting influenced Persian art through trade, diplomatic ties,
evangelist and maritime contacts. This Europeanised aspect of
Persian painting developed a formidable style in the nineteenth
century and is celebrated simply as Qajar painting. Among the
Qajar dynasty paintings in Prince Sadruddin's collection is a
striking portrait of Fath Ali Shah, dated 1819. Prince
Sadruddin's great-grand-father, the first Aga Khan, was the son-in-law of Fath Ali Shah.
Indian Islamic art is syncretised with Hindu aesthetics. Even a
casual glance at the similarities between the Hindus and Muslims
of India is sufficient for a start. In religious practices,
during festivals and occasions of mourning, including funerals,
the two diverse religious groups come together in India.
The "Muharram" is a period of mourning for Ali and his family,
including his sons, Hasan and Husain, and their followers. Ali, a
cousin and son-in-law of the Prophet Muhammad, was martyred along
with his family and followers. The Shiites accept Ali as the
successor of the Prophet Muhammad. The Prophet had not nominated
his successor. Ali's position had been challenged and he lost.
This event, dating to the seventh century A.D. is commemorated
with Shiites dressed in black and reciting elegies in front of
"alums", the Shiite standards, usually free-standing calligraphy
created in silver or copper, and at times even of gold. In the
case of Indian Shiites, they carry the "taziya", a green or white
paper mosque or mausoleum in miniature. The "taziya" is borne to
the water's edge, then released in the water. Similarly, the
alums are also immersed in water. While the inexpensive, though
religiously inspired taziya is left to float and disintegrate in
the water, the alums, expensive and with considerable iconic
significance, are returned to their special shrines or stored in
religious treasuries until the following year. The rituals of the
alums and the taziya are worth studying alongside Hindu customs
that prevail during the festival of Ganesha, the son of Siva.
Whether Muslims, with these rituals, follow Hindus, or vice
versa, is unimportant. The fact that remains striking is the
similarity in this case of the two diverse faiths of Indian
peoples - Hindus and Muslims. Small wonder that among
conservative Muslims outside the subcontinent, the Indian Muslims
are treated as country cousins at best.
The early beginnings of Islam in India were limited to the
coastal waters of the subcontinent. The Arabs arrived by sea and
settled in Sind, now part of Pakistan, and also along the regions
north of Bombay and at the tip of southern India. These events
took place in the early eighth century A.D. As most of these
Arabs traded, India remained undisturbed until the Afghans
descended into the plains of Hindustan in the tenth and eleventh
centuries. All the same, Islamic art made little impact beyond
Delhi, where the Sultanate was established and where some of its
architectural remains can still be seen. Late into the thirteenth
century the Muslims suddenly seemed to gain control of northern
India and by the fourteenth century, their presence was felt as
far south as the Deccan plateau. The architecture of the Tughlaq
dynasty (1320-1398) and the somewhat later dynastic consolidation
of Muslim kingdoms in the Deccan led to wonderful cities being
founded such as Bijapur, Bidar and Golconda. Prince Sadruddin has
an entire manuscript of a 1399 Quran ascribed to Gwalior. It is a
rare and important work of art, quite aside from its religious
significance. By the time the Mughals arrived in India in 1526,
traces of Islamic presence could still be felt among the Hindu
majority.
By tradition, Hindus delighted in their scripture, but
historiography, travelling accounts and memoirs were second
nature to Muslims. Muslims kept journals. Imagine a boy of
thirteen, standing inspired, conquering Hindustan, then setting
out to landscape gardens. This was Babur (1526-1530), who founded
the Mughal Empire (also known as the House of Timur) and
continued writing his memoirs and composing poetry. Babur's son,
though effete in comparison to the great Mughals, nonetheless
played a vital role as an art patron. Humayun (1530 - 1556),
Babur's son, exiled to Safavid Persia, brought back to India
painters trained in the ateliers of Shah Tahmasp. Thus Humayun,
often overlooked, is to be accepted as a catalyst.
Once Akbar (1556 - 1605) took charge of the Mughal empire from
his father Humayun, he extended it and improved his relations
with the chivalric Hindus, the Rajputs. It was then that Muslim
art experienced a metamorphosis in India. Emperor Akbar has long
epitomised the renaissance man in India. In fact he is credited
with the Mughal renaissance.
With his government under control, a magnificent court that
contained "Naorattan", nine of India's most gifted men in the
highest echelons of his empire, Akbar retained the best available
painters. These talented artists synthesised the Mughal painting
style from Persian, indigenous Indian and European sources. The
realistic painting showed the diversity of Indian life, and
included some specimens from the plethora of India's fauna and
flora. The Akbari paintings concentrated on action.
Akbar's son Jahangir (A.D. 1605-1627), was a half Hindu, the son
of Akbar's first wife, the Rajput Princess Joda Bai. Unlike the
history painting and illustrations of religious epics under
Akbar, both Hindu and Muslim, Jahangir championed individual
portraits and natural history subjects.
Shah Jahan (1627 -1657) Jahangir's son, turned more towards
religion. He lived at a time when the Mughals were at the height
of their prosperity, and the paintings of his court depict the
formal elegance of Mughal India. A cold, distant, even somewhat
restrained effect marked the paintings of an age best remembered
for the Taj Mahal (completed in 1654).
So, from this rich spectrum, Prince Sadruddin has several
examples of Mughal paintings, covering all the leading epochs.
The early Mughal paintings show the Timurid strains, the Mongol
links (obvious in their sinicised eyes) and the rock formations
idealised in Chinese paintings. The Safavid elements mingled, the
Hindus contributed, and what surfaced as Mughal art is well
represented in Prince Sadruddin's collection. The "Pictorial
Genealogy of Jahangir" is a painting that to my mind typifies the
abiding enthusiasm which Muslim patrons of art have had for
Islamic history. This is what I consider the "roots-syndrome"
which is indicative of a continuing heritage.
Along with anonymous Mughal painters, there are such famous names
as Abd al-Samad, Makund, Basawan, Mitra, Balchand, Abu'l-Hasan,
Bishnadas, Muhammad'Ali; they are all represented in the Prince's
Collection. This is not a "Who's - Who" of Mughal painters but a
sophisticated round-up of historical scenes, courtiers, gorgeous
tulips and aged pilgrims - a synthesis, one might say, of the
best Mughal paintings that have become available in the last
thirty years. There are fine examples from the schools of Deccani
painting. The 1650 "Floral Fantasy" is typical of the excellence
for which the Prince aspired, when putting all these diverse
Islamic works of art together.
Then there are the paintings from the twilight years of the
Mughals and the British Raj, such as Story-teller, Dancer and
Musicians, dated 1810 - 1820 from the Fraser Album that Sotheby's
auctioned a few years ago. The setting is full of men eager to
enjoy themselves, entertain and be entertained, simply by making
music and there is an unmistakable air of revelry. The oral
tradition of narration, so deeply ingrained in the Muslim psyche,
is evoked in this painting. This was a world governed by poetry
and enhanced by dancing.
It is this quality and the amazing diversity of all types of
flowers from the vast fields of Islamic art, that one detects in
the collection of Prince Sadruddin Aga Khan. The beauty of it all
is the fact that the Prince is continuing to collect Islamic art.
A very small portion of it has been on view at New York City's
Metropolitan Museum of Art. A wider selection entitled "Arts of
the Islamic Book," an exhibition curated by Anthony Welch and
Stuart Cary Welch ( the two scholars are unrelated) originated at
the Asia Society in Manhattan in the autumn of 1982. From there
it travelled to the Kimbell Museum, Fort Worth, Texas, and the
Nelson Gallery-Atkins Museum, Kansas City, during 1983.
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