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Lot Essay
Tony Falk describes Abu'l Qasim as an artist who "possessed great skill and who adopted a very distinct style for his portraits" (S.J.Falk, Qajar Paintings, Persian Oil Paintings of the 18th and 19th Centuries, London, 1972, p.39). B.W. Robinson writes that he may have been a native of Shiraz, working away from the artists at the Tehran court. This would explain why this artist, in spite of his ability, was not employed for court commissions by Fath 'Ali Shah (B.W.Robinson, ' The Court Painters of Fath 'Ali Shah', Eretz-Israel, vol.7, Jerusalem, 1964, p.103). Very few of Abu'l Qasim's works survive. Those that do appear to be from a single series of pictures of which three were formerly in the Amery Collection. Two of them, each signed and dated AH 1231/1816 AD, depict young female musicians, one playing a drum and the other a guitar (Falk, op.cit., nos.19-21). The third is unfortunately is in poor condition and has been considerably reduced. Stylistically they are very close indeed to our painting. Like ours, the two ladies in the Amery paintings sit in a carpeted interior before a balustrade and plain horizon holding their instruments in their hands and with wine on trays before them. Their clothes, like our lady, are heavy with pearls and stones and their long hair curls down their back, but with a feeling of lightness. Falk suggests that the two Amery paintings quite possibly came from the same original canvas (Falk, op.cit., p.40). Another portrait in that collection, which depicts Fath 'Ali Shah sitting on a pearl-studded cushion, was probably originally the centerpiece of the group (Falk, op.cit., no.16).
B.W. Robinson writes that Abu'l Qasim's ladies "attain the utmost degree of bejeweled magnificence and smouldering voluptuousness, and are undoubtedly the most successful surviving representations of the Persian ideal of feminine beauty by an artist of the period" (Robinson, op.cit., p.191). Our lady, as the Amery examples, plays to the Qajar ideals of beauty. These Diba describes as including "joined eyebrows, almond-shaped eyes, puckered lips and flamboyant hairdo" (Layla S. Diba (ed.), Royal Persian Paintings. The Qajar Epoch 1785-1925, exhibition catalogue, 1998, p.207). In her description of a portrait of two harem girls attributed to Mirza Baba, Diba describes them as members of the harem, possibly concubines of the ruler, on the basis that had they been entertainers bought in to the harem to perform, they would not have been wined and dined in the manner portrayed (Diba, op.cit., no.57, pp.206-07).
B.W. Robinson writes that Abu'l Qasim's ladies "attain the utmost degree of bejeweled magnificence and smouldering voluptuousness, and are undoubtedly the most successful surviving representations of the Persian ideal of feminine beauty by an artist of the period" (Robinson, op.cit., p.191). Our lady, as the Amery examples, plays to the Qajar ideals of beauty. These Diba describes as including "joined eyebrows, almond-shaped eyes, puckered lips and flamboyant hairdo" (Layla S. Diba (ed.), Royal Persian Paintings. The Qajar Epoch 1785-1925, exhibition catalogue, 1998, p.207). In her description of a portrait of two harem girls attributed to Mirza Baba, Diba describes them as members of the harem, possibly concubines of the ruler, on the basis that had they been entertainers bought in to the harem to perform, they would not have been wined and dined in the manner portrayed (Diba, op.cit., no.57, pp.206-07).