A SEATED DERVISH, POSSIBLY NUR ‘ALI SHAH, PERSIA, QAJAR, EARLY 19TH CENTURY

Sotheby’s London, 7 October 2009, lot 74.

G. Fellinger, L'empire des roses. Chefs d'oeuvre de l'art persan du XIX siecle, Lens, 2018, cat.no.95, p.105.

The dervish has been recently identified as Nur ‘Ali Shah (d.1801), a mystical sufi poet (Fellinger 2018, p.105). The arch and kashkul are decorated with inscriptions, only visible on close examination, connected to the sufi notion of visible and invisible as primordial concepts.