PARIS, FRANCE.- The Louvre Museum presents “Treasury of the World” - Jeweled Arts of India in the Age of the Mughals, on view through September 4, 2006. This exhibition presents the most beautiful pieces from the collection of Indian jewels and precious objects assembled over many years by Sheikh Nasser Sabah al-Ahmad al-Sabah. It pays tribute to the keen appreciation for beauty and rarity, the extreme refinement and opulence that dazzled visitors to the princely courts of India during the reigns of the Great Mughals. The jeweled arts of the Mughal period provide a splendid illustration of the fruitful confluence between the aristocratic civilization carried from Central Asia by the descendants of the 14th-century Mongol conqueror Tamerlane (or Timur) and wondrous India with its flourishing trade routes, where artists and craftsmen employed their talents, spurred by the enthusiasm of highly enlightened and wealthy patrons. Before definitively returning to the Kuwait National Museum, the Mughal marvels of the al-Sabah Collection are today revealed to the French public for the very first time.

The aim of this exceptional exhibition is to provide the most complete overview possible of the resplendent, elegant and highly developed range of Indian jeweled arts during the Mughal period. More than anywhere else in the world, it was on the Indian subcontinent that jeweled arts found their fullest expression, reaching their zenith under the Great Mughals, who ruled in India from 1526 until 1857 and were renowned for their grand imperial vision, opulence and appreciation of artistry. Among other works of Islamic art spanning the 7th to the 19th century, the al-Sabah Collection includes the largest grouping of Mughal jewels in the world.

The exhibition is organized thematically into thirteen sections to reveal the rich range of motifs and styles as well as the enormous variety of techniques mastered by Indian artists and craftsmen in the Mughal period. Their prodigious inventiveness and boundless imagination are amply demonstrated by the more than three hundred breathtaking objects displayed (rings, necklaces, earrings, bracelets, turban ornaments, daggers, flasks, boxes, etc.) - all exquisitely crafted with extraordinary delicacy and refinement. The objects on view may elicit a reaction similar to that of the first English ambassador to the Mughal court, Sir Thomas Roe (1580–1644), who, astounded by the opulence of Emperor Jahangir’s jewels, described him as “the treasury of the world”: “In jewells (which is one of his felicityes) hee is the treasury of the world, buyeing all that comes, and heaping rich stones as if hee would rather build then weare them.” (Letter written on October 30, 1616, to Prince Charles, later King Charles I).

Exhibition curators: Manuel Keene and Salam Kaoukji, curators of The al-Sabah Collection, Dar al-Athar al-Islamiyyah, Kuwait National Museum and Sophie Makariou, curator, Department of Islamic Art, Musée du Louvre.

The al-Sabah Collection - Assembled beginning in the mid-1970s by Sheikh Nasser Sabah al-Ahmad al-Sabah and his wife Sheikha Hussah Sabah al-Salim al-Sabah, this distinguished collection was offered by the couple on permanent loan to the Kuwait National Museum in 1983. All but 59 of its outstanding pieces survived the vicissitudes of the 1990 Gulf War, during which most of the holdings were transported to Baghdad under the orders of Saddam Hussein, later to be returned to Kuwait through the agency of the UN. With passion and rigor, Sheikh Nasser has amassed a collection that he has intended as representative of the breadth and diversity of Islamic art. Although it is unquestionably one of the most comprehensive and remarkable collections of Islamic art in the world, the al-Sabah Collection is celebrated most of all for including the most exceptional grouping of Indian jewels and precious objects in existence. Most of these works of jewelry were produced before the end of the 17th century, reflecting Sheikh Nasser’s particular collection strategy: while naturally attracted to the most beautiful pieces, he is especially interested in those that make a significant contribution to the overall appreciation of the artistic production of the region during this period. The origins and unrivaled quality of the works in the collection reflect a historical reality: the most beautiful and inventive pieces were generally those produced at the height of the Mughal empire, during the reigns of the Great Mughals Akbar, Jahangir, Shah Jahan, and Awrangzib (between 1556 and 1707). The golden age of Indian jeweled arts This exhibition, the first visit to France of the jewels of the al-Sabah Collection, is also the first international exhibition devoted to jeweled arts in the Mughal period. The pieces presented exemplify the artistic subtlety, creative genius and technical mastery of the Indian artists and craftsmen of the 16th and 17th centuries.

The Indian subcontinent is a land naturally rich in gems and was also the first to develop connoisseurship in precious stones. From ancient times, Indian artists and craftsmen constituted a unique body of technical knowledge, which gave rise to the most widely varied range of jeweled arts in the world. These pieces were commissioned by Mughal patrons not only for their personal adornment and use, but also to serve as precious gifts between rulers, courtiers and diplomatic emissaries. Some of the most remarkable pieces on view here belonged to a succession of Mughal emperors, while many others were the proud possessions of a number of princely patrons. Without exception, they illustrate the dazzling mastery of Indian jewelry artists, whose preferred materials were gold, rubies, emeralds, diamonds, and pearls.