Hour 13:12 16 Feb 26

Ismail Jalayir, an Iranian painter and calligrapher, was active in the thirteenth century AH (the second half of the nineteenth century CE). He learned painting under the supervision of masters of the Naseri period and at the Dar al-Funun School. He engaged in portraiture and the painting of religious subjects, and experimented with various styles of naturalistic painting in his works. He also practiced calligraphy in combination with pen-case (qalamdan) painting.

In his work entitled Ismail, executed in oil on canvas, the depiction of the inner states of the figures is evident. A circular composition has been employed in the work (the circle has been used as the underlying structure for the arrangement of the figures). The circle is considered a symbol of the heavens and the celestial realm.

The eye, with a soft and fluid movement, circulates across the entire surface of the work, and the dynamism and movement within the piece are achieved through form, line, and color. Through the drawing and repetition of shapes, lines, points, and specific motifs in various states, texture has been created in the work. The uniform rhythm of the figures, by removing them from a repetitive sequence and introducing variation in the gray tonalities, has been transformed into an alternating rhythm.