In the 1570s and '80s the vogue for albums made up of single–page paintings and drawings and calligraphies developed. Hunting scenes such as this one excerpted figural groupings and other details from manuscript illustrations which would have contained numerous figures and animals. In addition to painting the rocks in shades of shades of grey, blue and brown wash, the artist has included red drips denoting the blood of the goat into which the cheetah has dug its claws. The absence of a bow in the hunter's hands suggests that the drawing was not completed.
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Artwork Details
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Title:Hunting Scene
Date:late 16th century
Geography:Attributed to Iran, Qazvin
Medium:Ink and watercolor on paper
Dimensions:H. 9 in. (22.9 cm) W. 5 1/4 in. (13.3 cm)
Classification:Codices
Credit Line:Bequest of George D. Pratt, 1935
Accession Number:45.174.16
Hunting Scene
This hunting scene is a highly finished work of art, again worthy of presentation to a connoisseur. Unlike the orchestration of figures and forms spread out across the picture space in the drawing Courtiers Hunting (MMA no. 17.81.2, cat. no. 7 in this volume), the towering rocks of the mountainous landscape evoke a totally different mood. The well-bred lineage of the riders and their mounts is of less importance than in no. 17.81.2. Here, in contrast, they appear in conjunction with the wild forces of the natural world. In both drawings a leopard attacking an antelope looks over its shoulder at the attacking hunter; in this one, however, the impression is given that the beast of prey has been surprised during its kill by the archer suddenly emerging from the cover of the rocky escarpment. In the foreground a naturalistically realized boar dashes for cover. A hunter with a raised sword, galloping in from the other direction, is after a pair of stags with magnificent antlers. A hare and a gazelle dash madly in opposite directions in the space separating the two hunters. The open ground sweeps up between the jumbled rock piles, drawing the eye into their midst. These distant rocks are rich in more animal life and abound as well with concealed animal forms in their own contorted shapes.
This drawing, in its treatment of landscape, animals, human figures, and horses, as well as the subtle light touches of color, is very like the drawing Hero and Dragon (MMA 25.83.7, cat. no. 9 in this volume), and was probably done by the same skillful artist. Both are extraordinarily accomplished finished works of art and share the same combination of naturalism, idealism, and lyricism.
A hunter attacking a leopard is far less usual than the time-honored subject of the hunter or hero in confrontation with a lion. Although it sometimes occurs, as does the occasional subject of a lion with its prey, the more usual convention shows the lion alone (MMA 55.121.18).[1]
[Swietochowski and Babaie 1989]
Footnotes:
1. See also Sotheby's, April 3, 1978, lot 33, showing an Indian hunter spearing a leopard, Khorasan, ca. 1580. The Museum has another drawing (17.81.1) that shows a figure on foot attacking a leopard helped by a mounted companion. For a similar scene, see Pope, Arthur Upham, and Phyllis Ackerman, editors. A Survey of Persian Art from Prehistoric Times to the Present. London and New York, 1939, vol. V, pt. 2, pI. 919 B.
George D. Pratt, New York (by 1933–d. 1935); Vera Amherst Hale Pratt, New York (life interest 1935–45)
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Persian Drawings in The Metropolitan Museum of Art," September 13–December 31, 1989, no. 8.
Swietochowski, Marie, and Sussan Babaie. Persian Drawings in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1989. no. 8, pp. 26–27, ill. pl. 8 (b/w).
Sims, Eleanor, B. Marshak, and Ernst J. Grube. "Persian Painting and its Sources." In Peerless Images. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2002. p. 66, ill. fig. 73 (color).
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