Jahangir Preferring a Sufi Shaikh
Bichitr. India c. 1620 C.E. Watercolor gold, and ink on paper
Jahangir's artists begin to create allegorical portraits with symbolic references. This painting, for example, asserts that Jahangir favors the spiritual over the worldly. He hands a book, the most respected of objects in both Islam and the Mughal court, to a Sufi shaykh (a religious scholar). Below (and therefore implicitly less important than) the shaykh stand an Ottoman sultan and King James I of England. Bichitr's self-portrait in the lower left corner conveys the respect that Jahangir accorded to painters.
Form:
- This piece uses a mixture of gold, ink and watercolor on traditional asian paper
Function:
- this would have been originally found in an album that had alternating paintings and calligraphic scriptures
- these have now been dispersed
Content:
- shows the 4th emperor of the Mughal Dynasty Jahangir
- gold flames come out of his head which lead into a gold circle that surrounds his head
- also has a moon which creates a contrast between sun and moon
- this represents the rulers power and his divine knowledge
- Jahangir is seated on a stone inlaid platform
- platform is also connected to a hourglass
- he is also the biggest of all the people portrayed
- they are all on a embroidered blue carpet with intricate designs on it
- the third person in line to see the emperor was King James the I of England
- this shows not only the connection but the power difference that they wanted to portray in the work
- Has the Shaikh or the holy man, who has been put on almost the same level as Jahangir himself
- this shows his devotion to religional
Context:
- Jahangir wanted to bring together distant lands as seen in the painting
- Has James the I in the painting
- used many different aspects of European art and art of a different time period
- the carpet that everyone sits on
- the cherubs
- artist wanted to sign his name so he put himself in the painting
- very strong belief in religion, so they made the two holy men bigger and more important than everyone else
