SIGNED MUHAMMAD 'ALI, SAFAVID ISFAHAN, CIRCA 1650

The pair to our portrait is published in Toby Falk (ed.), Treasures of Islam, exhibition catalogue, Geneva, 1985, p.122, no.93. That painting depicts a pageboy holding a blue and white bowl and wearing a green robe, decorated in a manner very similar to ours. Like ours, the Geneva page-boy is signed by Muhammad ‘Ali. Massumeh Farhad writes of Muhammad ‘Ali as one of Reza ‘Abbasi’s foremost followers and one who drew upon his master’s artistic achievements to develop his own personal calligraphic style. Describing the Geneva painting she writes that ‘the crisp, clean lines delineating the figure…have been reduced to the most essential, while…creating a subtle interplay of colours’. She writes of how equal attention is lavished on the carefully composed flower bushes producing an effect not unlike that of some Safavid textiles (Falk, op.cit., p.122).