Black and White Bird Perched on a Shrub (1651–52): Art, History and Details

Black and White Bird Perched on a Shrub (1651–52) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is Shafi' Abbasi (Iranian).

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

In Iran between the 1630s and 1650s, the court painter Shafi’ ‘Abbasi, son of the renowned painter Riza ‘Abbasi, specialized in a new fashion depicting naturalistic plants and birds, some adapted from European sources such as botanical engravings or herbals. Several have been identified as patterns for textiles, evidenced by pricked holes along the contours, which allowed designs to be transferred to another surface. The inscription indicates that Shafi’ ‘Abbasi made this painting for Shah Abbas II in 1651-52. Presumably, he copied this composition from a European engraving.

Object facts

• Title: Black and White Bird Perched on a Shrub
• Date: 1651–52
• Creator attribution: Shafi' Abbasi (Iranian)
• Culture: Iran, Isfahan, Safavid period (1501-1722)
• Type: Manuscript
• Technique: opaque watercolor, ink, and gold on paper
• Dimensions: Sheet: 16.1 x 25 cm (6 5/16 x 9 13/16 in.); Image: 7.7 x 13.4 cm (3 1/16 x 5 1/4 in.)
• Collection: Islamic Art
• Department: Islamic Art
• Accession number: 1971.84

Collection credit

Andrew R. and Martha Holden Jennings Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• “Annual Report for 1971.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 59, no. 6 (June 1972): 147–179.
• Welch, Anthony. Shah ʹAbbas & the Arts of Isfahan. New York: The Asia Society; distributed by New York Graphic Society [Greenwich, CT], 1973.
• Welch, Anthony. "The Arts of Isfahan." Orientations, Vol. 4, no. 12 (December 1973).

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.