Indian and Persian Drawings

Sam Fogg is pleased to present Indian and Persian Drawings as part of the collaborative exhibition East Meets West mounted with Les Enluminures during Master Drawings New York. It is accompanied by a catalogue in two volumes, exploring the intricate worlds of European, Persian, and Indian art. The exhibition looks at the shared aspects of Eastern and Western traditions, with an emphasis on the use of materials, methods, and iconography. In Europe, an interest in exotic Eastern imagery, fashions, and peoples was making its way into prints, drawings, and paintings as early as the fifteenth century.  By the early modern period, the court of India and Persia were assimilating European print materials and pictorial modes into their workshops. Even where the two traditions diverge, as they often do, an emphasis on the luxury arts of the book characterizes both centers of production and connects them through material inquiry.  

Our catalogue includes twenty examples of some of the finest master drawings from India and Persia, most of which are entirely unpublished and will be exhibited for the very first time.  Examples include those by three of the greatest Mughal artists from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries:  Basawan, Govardhan, and Payag. It proceeds with a selection of Persian drawings which includes two works on paper attributed to the highly esteemed Persian draughtsman, Reza 'Abbasi alongside a magnificent sheet by the Safavid master of Farangi-sazi, or the new “European style” of the late seventeenth century, Muhammad Zaman.  In addition to stand-alone drawings and court portraiture, this group includes sheets and preparatory drawings from dispersed epic and poetic manuscripts which were produced at the Indian and Persian court ateliers. 

Right: Basawan (fl. 1580-1600), A beautiful woman in the guise of a European allegorical figure, India, Mughal dynasty, c. 1585-90