Leaf from the Muraqqa Gulshan

This painting shows the importance of Persian taste in the court of India’s Mughal dynasty. Details like the rocky hills in the background and the delicate flowering branches are strongly Persian in style. So too is the subject. The ensemble of youth, old man, a book of verse and a flowering tree commonly evoke in Persian art and poetry both artistic sensibility and the brevity of life. The idealized, rather than individualized figures also indicate Persian influence.