We are pleased to announce that the Department of Islamic Art at The Metropolitan Museum of Art has acquired two artworks from Shahpour Pouyan's Miniature series, entitled: After 'Portrait of the Uzbek Emir Shaybani Khan' and After 'Khusraw and Shirin.'
Pouyan reworks classic miniatures, using digital and manual manipulation to remove human figures from the artworks, then painstakingly recreates the original paintings. By removing the mythic and historic characters, the artist strips away their authority and brings into focus the miniatures' landscape, abstract shapes and colors. Devoid of any emblems of political power, the manipulated illustrations convey a mythical rendering of a lost reality concealed by carefully constructed narratives.
