Lamia Balafrej. The Making of the Artist in Late Timurid Painting

How did Persian artists self-represent themselves within paintings in the absence of a tradition of self-portraiture? How did Persian beholders engage themselves with the style of painting in the past? By addressing these fundamental questions in the study of Persian painting, The Making of the Artist in Late Timurid Painting examines the performative and self-representational abilities of Persian artists through the detailed examination of the Cairo Bustan, the earliest surviving illustrated copy of the Bustan ("The Orchard") of the thirteenth-century Shirazi poet Sa'di made around 1488 in Herat for the late Timurid Sultan Husayn Bayqara (r. ca. 1470-1506) and now kept in the National Library of Egypt (Dar al-kutub) in Cairo (Adab farisi 22). With the aim to provide the first comprehensive analysis of the Cairo Bustan that contains the only surviving genuine signatures of the celebrated Herati artist Kamal al-Din Bihzad (d. 1535), this book explores a series of hitherto underestimated aspects of Persian pictorial culture, not only colours, lines and compositions but also inscriptions and signatures as a symbolic means of the artists' self-reflection

Ancient history · Art · Art history · Painting · Eurasian Exchange Networks · Historical and Architectural Studies · History · Islamic Studies and History