Lectures in Islamic Art

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Central Asian art in the collections of the Fitzwilliam Museum, University of Cambridge

by Dr Firuza Melville, Embassy of Uzbekistan, London, 6.30 pm
9 Feb 2023

Firuza Melville will speak on her research conducted as part of her contribution to the International project ‘Uzbek Cultural Legacy in World Collections’, where she has been the Project curator of the publications related to the British collections of Central Asian art. She has been the editor-in-chief and contributor of the volume dedicated to the collections of Central Asian art in the Fitzwilliam Museum. She has also written chapters on Central Asian book art for the catalogue of Central Asian art in the British collections with a focus on the artefacts from the British Museum in London, Ashmolean Museum in Oxford and the Glasgow museums. Her next project is the publication of Central Asian manuscripts in the collections of the Main Library of the University of Cambridge

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Event

War Games: Art, Ephemera and the Qajar Soldiery

Lecture by Natasha Morris, British Museum
12 Mar 2020, 5:30pm Outer Parlour< Pembroke College

War Games: Art, Ephemera and the Qajar Soldiery

Lecture by Natasha Morris, British Museum

From the mid-nineteenth century, small lacquer playing cards for the game of aas nas reached the height of their popularity and ubiquity. Amongst the five suites of a deck, the cards dedicated to the image of the ‘sarbaz’ or solider were adorned with figures inspired by the contemporary recruits of the Qajar army. With the dress and training of the troops being a result of modernising reforms in the early 1800s, the idiosyncratic decoration of the cards came to reflect a social reality of army life. Playing cards, understudied as part of a wider provisional material culture in Iran, were integral part in the homosocial life of Qajar men both within an army context and beyond; indicative of practices of vice, competition and play that were facilitated by these highly aestheticized gambling games.

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Event

An Aesthetic Education in Sultanate India: Sound and Wonder in the Miftāḥ al-Fużalā of Shadiyabadi (British Library Or 3299)

Lecture by Vivek Gupta, SOAS University of London
14 Feb 2020, 5:30pm Nihon Room, Pembroke College, Cambridge

All students know that we are more likely to learn from a teacher who excites us, stirs our curiosity, and indeed our passion for wonder. This lecture introduces a multilingual illustrated dictionary made in sultanate India that immersed its readers in an aesthetic education through sound and wonder. The illustrated manuscript of interest is the Key of the Learned (Miftāḥ al-Fużalā, British Library Or 3299) attributed to Mandu circa 1490. Although the Key of the Learned contains quadruple the number of illustrations in comparison to Mandu’s famed Book of Delights (Ni‘matnāmah), it has received minimal scholarly attention. This study thus opens up new vistas onto sultanate book culture and has broader implications for early modern art well into the sixteenth century. The Miftāḥ al-Fużalā’s definitions encompass nearly every facet of Indo-Islamicate art history. It provides a critical vocabulary for subjects including musical instruments, textiles, metalwork, jewelry, arms and armor, and architecture.  The information transmitted by the Miftāḥ is not limited to the Persian, Hindavi, and Arabic language of the text, but also the visual knowledge depicted in paintings. This study thus argues that the Miftāḥ’s manuscript as a whole has a close relationship to the genre of the Islamicate cosmography and reveals its author’s penchant for wonder.

Vivek Gupta is completing his PhD at SOAS University of London in History of Art. His thesis, Wonder Reoriented: Manuscripts and Experience in Islamicate Societies of South Asia (ca. 1450—1600), examines a corpus of illustrated compendia of wonders in Persian, Arabic, and vernacular Indic languages.

Image credits: British Library Or 3299, f. 161a, pearl-borer

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Event

Cut, Paste, Patch Constructing Safavid Album Folios; Lecture by Naciem Nikkhah

CLIA lecture
23 May 2019, 5:30pm

Cutout papers with calligraphy often border single sheets of drawing and painting from the Safavid period, mounted on illuminated margins and often bound into an album. While some of these images are signed or can be attributed stylistically to an artist, the calligraphy and the page compositions are difficult to date with certainty. This talk will discuss the relationship between word and image in such folios and argues that with a close reading of the text and understanding its accord with the image, some hypotheses can be proposed on the time and place of its compilation. Furthermore, the possible origins of the design and compilers of such compositions will be explored

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Event

Portraiture in Safavid Iran: lecture by Dr Sheila Canby

CLIA lecture
15 May 2019, 5:30pm

Portraiture in Safavid Iran

Over the course of the sixteenth century artists’ approach to portraiture evolved in Iran. Whereas few figures were depicted with individualized facial details in the first half of the century, the introduction of European prints through trade and travelers stimulated a gradual shift toward greater verisimilitude in portraiture. This illustrated talk will consider the changing pictorial style in Safavid Iran, its sources and its practitioners.

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