Live Auction 15505Art of the Islamic and Indian Worlds Including Oriental Rugs and Carpets
A STANDING PORTRAIT OF SULTAN MUHAMMAD QUTB SHAH OF GOLCONDA
Lot 139 VARIOUS PROPERTIES

A STANDING PORTRAIT OF SULTAN MUHAMMAD QUTB SHAH OF GOLCONDA

DECCAN, CENTRAL INDIA, SECOND HALF 18TH/EARLY 19TH CENTURY; THE QUATRAIN, MESHED, IRAN, DATED AH 1064/1654 AD

Closed25 October 2018

Price Realised

GBP 15,000

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A STANDING PORTRAIT OF SULTAN MUHAMMAD QUTB SHAH OF GOLCONDA
DECCAN, CENTRAL INDIA, SECOND HALF 18TH/EARLY 19TH CENTURY; THE QUATRAIN, MESHED, IRAN, DATED AH 1064/1654 AD
Opaque pigments heightened with gold on paper, facing right, haloed, wearing a green tunic and gold sashes and bearing a khanda, within gold scrolling borders on wide gilt floral and anthropomorphic margins, identification in loose nasta'liq below; verso with nasta'liq quatrain, with similar borders and margins, each side foliated 77 and 78, old collection stamp in Cyrillic and old collection entry numbers in Persian numerals
Painting 6 3/8 x 2 ¾in. (16.2 x 7cm.); folio 13 7/8 x 9in. (35.4 x 22.8cm.)

Specialist note

This portrait depicts Sultan Muhammad Qutb Shah (r.1611-1625), the sixth ruler of the kingdom of Golconda in the Deccan under the Qutb Shahi dynasty. His face with its arched eyebrows, thin, angular moustache and a cap-like turban can be compared with a seventeenth century portrait of him (Zebrowski, 1983, p.176, fig.142). However, the posture and dress of the figure appear to have been inspired by known portraits of his son, Sultan ‘Abdullah Qutb Shah (r.1626-1672). A closely comparable portrait, now in the Musée National des Artes Asiatiques-Guimet in Paris (MA 5026), is illustrated in Haidar and Sardar, 2015, cat.131, pp.238-239.