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Dec 30, 2013

Sep 15, 2015

Oct 7, 2015

Nov 6, 2015

Nur Jahan Holding a Portrait of Emperor Jahangir

c. 1627

Bishandas

(Indian)

Northern India, Mughal court, 17th century

Gum tempera and gold on paper

Painting only: 13.6 x 6.4 cm (5 3/8 x 2 1/2 in.); Page: 30 x 22.1 cm (11 13/16 x 8 11/16 in.)

Gift in honor of Madeline Neves Clapp; Gift of Mrs. Henry White Cannon by exchange; Bequest of Louise T. Cooper; Leonard C. Hanna Jr. Fund; From the Catherine and Ralph Benkaim Collection 2013.325

Location

not on view

Did you know?

Jahangir died at 58, outliving his younger brothers by about 25 years.

Description

The empress Nur Jahan, Jahangir’s favorite wife, exercised influence in affairs of state. By all accounts, including those of Jahangir himself and European visitors to the Mughal court, she was a remarkable and brilliantly capable woman. This painting may have been made shortly after the death of Jahangir. He appears aged in his portrait, and it echoes a similar composition from another painting in which Jahangir holds a painted portrait of his deceased father, Akbar.

Provenance

?-1969

(Maggs Brothers, London, UK, sold to Ralph Benkaim)

1969-2013

Ralph Benkaim [1914-2001] and Catherine Glynn Benkaim [b. 1946], Beverly Hills, CA, sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art

2013-

The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH

Citations

Beach, Milo Cleveland, Stuart Cary Welch, and Glenn D. Lowry. The Grand Mogul: Imperial Painting in India, 1600-1660. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 1978. cat. no. 57

Vaughan, Philippa. "Begams of the House of Timur and the Dynastic Image." In Humayun's Garden Party: Princes of the House of Timur and Early Mughal Painting, 117-134. Edited by Sheila R. Canby. Bombay: Marg Publications, 1994. Mentioned and Reproduced: p. 132, fig. 13

Komaroff, Linda, and Sheila Blair. Gifts of the Sultan: The Arts of Giving at the Islamic Courts. Los Angeles: Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 2011. cat. no. 59, p. 177

Mace, Sonya Rhie, Mohsen Ashtiany, Catherine Glynn, Pedro Moura Carvalho, Marcus Fraser, and Ruby Lal. Mughal Paintings: Art and Stories: the Cleveland Museum of Art. London: D Giles Limited, 2016. Reproduced: cat. no. 54, pp. 216, 303

Lal, Ruby. Empress: The Astonishing Reign of Nur Jahan. New York, NY : W.W. Norton & Company, 2018. Reproduced: color plate after p. 142

Rice, Yael and Sonja Drimmer. "How Scientists Use and Abuse Portraiture" Hyperallergic, December 11, 2020, https://hyperallergic.com/604897/how-scientists-use-and-abuse-portraiture/ hyperallergic.com

Griswold, William M. “Recent Acquisitions (2013-20) at the Cleveland Museum of Art.” Burlington Magazine 163, no. 1414 (January 2021): 93-104. Mentioned and reproduced: P. 102, no. 19; mentioned: P. 93

Kazmi, Nuzhat. Awrãq-E Muṣavvir: Mughal Art of Portraiture: the Intellectual Context and Content. Gurugram: Three Essays Collective, 2022. Mentioned: P. 197, 206, 219; Reproduced: plate 28

Exhibition history

The Grand Mogul. Sterliing and Francine Clark Institute, Williamstown, MA; Walters Art Gallery, Baltimore, MD; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA; Asia House Gallery, New York, NY (1978-1979).

Main Asian Rotation (Gallery 245). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (December 31, 2013-June 30, 2014).

Art and Stories from Mughal India. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (July 31-October 23, 2016).

Cite this page

{{cite web|title=Nur Jahan Holding a Portrait of Emperor Jahangir|url=https://clevelandart.org/art/2013.325|author=Bishandas|year=c. 1627|access-date=21 September 2023|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

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Nur Jahan Holding a Portrait of Emperor Jahangir

Nur Jahan Holding a Portrait of Emperor Jahangir

Bishandas

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