A painted cotton qanat (tent Panel) fragment, north India, possibly Jaipur, 18th century

Sotheby's, London, 27 April 2005, lot 1

Qanat panels provided an important element for the interior decoration of internal space as a result of the peripatetic nature of the Mughal court. Either individually, or sewn together as repeat pattern rows, they were employed as moveable screens in both the tents of hunting parties and various palaces used during tours of inspection.

The pattern of a flowering shrub encompassed by a cusped arch was almost certainly influenced by sixteenth century Safavid prototypes, which entered the Mughal decorative vocabulary in the second quarter of the seventeenth century, see, for example, the now partially destroyed tile patterns of the Chini ka Rauza mausoleum in Agra, dating from circa 1639.

The popularity of this pattern can certainly be attributed to Jahangir’s passionate interest in botany and his active encouragement of the depiction of flowers and plants in the work for the court ateliers, with the result that it became an entrenched element in Mughal design. For an evocative sixteenth century miniature, painted depicting the outer tent enclosure with hangings of repeat niches with red ground, white flowers and green cypress trees, see Akbar Hunting, gouache and gold on paper, by Miskina and Sarwan, Mughal, circa 1590 (Victoria and Albert Museum, London: acc. no.IS.2-1896 - 55/117).

A panel comprising four niches of almost identical design to the present example was sold in these rooms, 10 June 2020, lot 143. Another comparable panel is in the AEDTA Collection, Paris (inv. no.1154), illustrated as fig.4a in HALI, no.54, 1990, p.121, and two related fragmentary qanat panels also from the collection of the late Howard Hodgkin were sold in these rooms, 24 October 2017, Howard Hodgkin, Portrait of the Artist, lot 164.