Historical / contextual reference

Photograph of the specific selected museum object; identity checked by object ID and accession.

Credit: Riza-yi 'Abbasi / The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Purchase, Francis M. Weld Gift, 1950
Rights: Public domain; Met Open Access

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Riza-yi ‘Abbasi draws an embracing couple so closely together that their bodies seem to occupy one enclosing contour. The small painting uses opaque watercolour, ink, and gold on paper, bringing the precision of line into an intimate encounter rather than a public scene of royal achievement. The Metropolitan Museum dates it to 1630 and places it within the artist’s late career at the Safavid court. Its inclusion helps prevent a future archive from treating historical courtly cultures as concerned only with war, ceremony, or authority. Sensuality, closeness, and the pleasures of looking also belonged to their visual worlds, although one painting cannot tell us how every contemporary viewer understood them.

Why preserve it: Curatorial interpretation: Historical art preserves intimacy and pleasure alongside official power; the two need not occupy entirely separate cultural worlds.

Keep in mind: The museum’s interpretation of changing attitudes under Shah Safi is not evidence that all people shared a single sexual morality. Avoid assigning identities or private biographies to the depicted couple.