Natalia Di Pietrantonio PhD ‘18 presented on "Erotic Archives: Wajid 'Ali Shah and His Patronage of Book Arts" at University of Washington.
In 1849, Wajid ‘Ali Shah penned the ‘Ishqnama manuscript. Its story recounts how Wajid ‘Ali, the last king and ruler of Avadh (Uttar Pradesh), maintained his lovers, how he wisely disposed of them, and the lovesickness wrought by these affairs. This talk, presented on Jan 21, 2021, asks: what does it mean to take the ‘Ishqnama’s miniature paintings and poetry seriously? Parts of this research have also been recently published in Modern Asian Studies journal.
Natalia Di Pietrantonio is an Assistant Curator of South Asian Art at the Seattle Art Museum. Previous to this position, she was the Bard Graduate Center’s Islamic Art and Material Culture postdoctoral fellow, and served as a Consortium for Faculty Diversity visiting professor in South Asian art history at Scripps College.
