Afzal al-Husayni
An Armenian Bishop (recto), Calligraphy (verson, c. 1453-1519), Page from an Albumcirca 1650

On view:

Geffen Galleries

Persian-style miniature painting, full-length portrait of a bearded man in a blue robe and tall blue crown, with a black cloak and religious pendant, set within a gold foliate border

Persian manuscript painting, full-length figure of a bearded man in a blue gold-patterned robe and black cloak, wearing a tall blue jeweled crown and holding a cross-topped staff, set against a pale ground with faint foliage, within a gilt decorative border.

Calligraphic panel in nasta'liq script, lines of black Persian script arranged diagonally across a pale blue-grey ground, with a gold and blue illuminated floral header in the upper right corner; mounted on cream paper speckled with gold.

Manuscript page with diagonal lines of bold Persian nastaliq calligraphy on a pale ground decorated with gold floral scrollwork; upper right corner features a blue panel with gold illuminated cloud and animal motifs; beige border with gold-speckled edges.

Artist or Maker: Afzal al-Husayni
Title: An Armenian Bishop (recto), Calligraphy (verson, c. 1453-1519), Page from an Album
Place Made: Iran, Isfahan
Date Made: circa 1650
Period: Safavid (1501-1732)
Medium: Ink, opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Dimensions: 11 1/2 x 16 1/2 in. Frame: 20 × 15 × 1 1/2 in. (50.8 × 38.1 × 3.81 cm)
Credit Line: The Nasli M. Heeramaneck Collection, gift of Joan Palevsky
Accession Number: M.73.5.456
Classification: Manuscripts
Collecting Area: Art of the Middle East: Islamic
Curatorial Notes: The Persian album (muraqq‘a), which flourished from the fifteenth to the seventeenth century, is a compendium of calligraphy and paintings bound in a booklike format, with facing pages of each medium arranged in alternate fashion. A form of collecting, the album is an idiosyncratic gathering of diverse materials organized by the compiler to reflect multilayered meanings that would have resonated with the elite, erudite audience for which it was intended. Like many Persian illustrated manuscripts, albums were likewise frequently unbound and dispersed, as is the case with this page.

This rare depiction of a bishop, the only known Safavid-era portrait of an Armenian cleric, fits well within the milieu of seventeenth-century Isfahan, home to a large Armenian population in New Julfa. Such elegant single-page compositions, made for or subsequently compiled in albums, often depict a broad spectrum of contemporary society. The painting, which is dominated by its subject’s dignified and commanding presence, is inscribed as the work of Afzal al-Husayni, a court artist and student of Riza-yi ‘Abbasi (see M.73.5.474), who produced both album paintings and manuscript illustrations. On the reverse is a quatrain on the disappointments of love, signed by the calligrapher Sultan ‘Ali Mashhadi, who was renowned for his mastery of the nasta‘liq script, which he elevated to its classical form.
Selected Bibliography: Pal, Pratapaditya, ed. Islamic Art: The Nasli M. Heeramaneck Collection. Los Angeles: Museum Associates, 1973.
Taylor, Alice. Book Arts of Isfahan: Diversity and Identity in Seventeenth-Century Persia. Malibu, CA: J. Paul Getty Museum, 1995.
Beyond boundaries : Islamic art across cultures. [Doha, Qatar : Museum of Islamic Art, 2008]
Pal, Pratapaditya, Thomas W. Lentz, Sheila R. Canby, Edwin Binney, 3rd, Walter B. Denny, and Stephen Markel. "Arts from Islamic Cultures: Los Angeles County Museum of Art." Arts of Asia 17, no. 6 (November/December 1987): 73-130.
Evans, Helen C., ed. Armenia: Art, Religion, and Trade in the Middle Ages. New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2018.

Afzal al-Husayni
An Armenian Bishop (recto), Calligraphy (verson, c. 1453-1519), Page from an Albumcirca 1650

On view:

Geffen Galleries

Artist or Maker: Afzal al-Husayni
Title: An Armenian Bishop (recto), Calligraphy (verson, c. 1453-1519), Page from an Album
Place Made: Iran, Isfahan
Date Made: circa 1650
Period: Safavid (1501-1732)
Medium: Ink, opaque watercolor and gold on paper
Dimensions: 11 1/2 x 16 1/2 in. Frame: 20 × 15 × 1 1/2 in. (50.8 × 38.1 × 3.81 cm)
Credit Line: The Nasli M. Heeramaneck Collection, gift of Joan Palevsky
Accession Number: M.73.5.456
Classification: Manuscripts
Collecting Area: Art of the Middle East: Islamic
Curatorial Notes: The Persian album (muraqq‘a), which flourished from the fifteenth to the seventeenth century, is a compendium of calligraphy and paintings bound in a booklike format, with facing pages of each medium arranged in alternate fashion. A form of collecting, the album is an idiosyncratic gathering of diverse materials organized by the compiler to reflect multilayered meanings that would have resonated with the elite, erudite audience for which it was intended. Like many Persian illustrated manuscripts, albums were likewise frequently unbound and dispersed, as is the case with this page.

This rare depiction of a bishop, the only known Safavid-era portrait of an Armenian cleric, fits well within the milieu of seventeenth-century Isfahan, home to a large Armenian population in New Julfa. Such elegant single-page compositions, made for or subsequently compiled in albums, often depict a broad spectrum of contemporary society. The painting, which is dominated by its subject’s dignified and commanding presence, is inscribed as the work of Afzal al-Husayni, a court artist and student of Riza-yi ‘Abbasi (see M.73.5.474), who produced both album paintings and manuscript illustrations. On the reverse is a quatrain on the disappointments of love, signed by the calligrapher Sultan ‘Ali Mashhadi, who was renowned for his mastery of the nasta‘liq script, which he elevated to its classical form.
Selected Bibliography: Pal, Pratapaditya, ed. Islamic Art: The Nasli M. Heeramaneck Collection. Los Angeles: Museum Associates, 1973.
Taylor, Alice. Book Arts of Isfahan: Diversity and Identity in Seventeenth-Century Persia. Malibu, CA: J. Paul Getty Museum, 1995.
Beyond boundaries : Islamic art across cultures. [Doha, Qatar : Museum of Islamic Art, 2008]
Pal, Pratapaditya, Thomas W. Lentz, Sheila R. Canby, Edwin Binney, 3rd, Walter B. Denny, and Stephen Markel. "Arts from Islamic Cultures: Los Angeles County Museum of Art." Arts of Asia 17, no. 6 (November/December 1987): 73-130.
Evans, Helen C., ed. Armenia: Art, Religion, and Trade in the Middle Ages. New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2018.