LONDON.- A landmark auction of Exceptional Paintings from The Personal Collection of Prince & Princess Sadruddin Aga Khan at Christie's London on 28 October will present the market with the unsurpassed opportunity to acquire masterpieces of Indian and Persian painting. Comprising 95 works, the sale features the paintings that Prince Sadruddin and Princess Catherine Aga Khan chose to live with at their home, Chateau de Bellerive, on the shores of Lake Geneva. This is truly a personal collection that reflects their impeccable taste and discerning eye for quality, rarity and beauty. The group includes some of the most important examples of their kind in any collection in the world, many having been studied and published by leading scholars of the 20th century and featured in ground-breaking exhibitions. With estimates ranging from £2,000 to £1,000,000, this personal collection is expected to realise in excess of £8 million.
Sara Plumbly, Christie's Head of Islamic & Indian Art commented: “We are deeply honoured to have been entrusted with the sale of this magnificent collection, formed by Prince Sadruddin and Princess Catherine Aga Khan between the 1960s and 1980s. Carefully assembled with a deep sensitivity to artistic excellence, history, and personal connection, these works transcend borders, cultures, and centuries. Each painting bears witness to their cultivated eye and intellectual curiosity. These paintings are rich in story, steeped in scholarship, and radiant with aesthetic power. Dating from the 16th to the end of the 19th centuries, the paintings exemplify outstanding quality, rarity, historical importance and provenance. Some are monumental official portrayals, while others are intimate and personal. The breadth of this collection is a joy, including a series of wonderful paintings by 17th century Isfahani masters such as Reza Abbasi, rare Ottoman works, Mughal, Deccani and Rajput masterpieces as well as iconic Company School paintings by the likes of Ghulam Ali Khan and Sheikh Muhammad Amir of Karraya. This sale presents collectors with an opportunity that appears once in a generation. We look forward to sharing this remarkable collection with connoisseurs, collectors, curators, scholars and the wider public.”
PRINCE SADRUDDIN & PRINCESS CATHERINE AGA KHAN
This is no ordinary collection, it is a reflection of two remarkable lives — those of the late Prince Sadruddin (1933-2003) and Princess Catherine Aga Khan — whose shared passion, vision, and refinement have left an important legacy, built with a spirit of generosity, cultural dialogue, and enlightened purpose. Born in France, Prince Sadruddin had a remarkable career, ascending to become the longest serving United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (1966-1977), which is a testament to his deep compassion, diplomatic brilliance, and tireless service to the world's most vulnerable. Prince Sadruddin married Princess Catherine in 1972. It was a union forged in love and an unwavering commitment to beauty, humanity and the environment. Together they championed the preservation of both natural and cultural treasures long before such efforts were recognised as globally urgent - their advocacy was bold, prescient, and quietly transformative. The United Nations community held a memorial in Prince Sadruddin's honour, at which the then Secretary-General Kofi Annan - who together with the UN were the co-recipients of the 2001 Nobel Peace Prize – commented “he combined respect for humankind with concern for our environment… while celebrating humanity through culture and art… a role model to many of us…his example will continue to inspire new world citizens for several generations to come.”
INDIAN PAINTINGS
Among the Mughal paintings is the famous Portrait of Shah Abu'l-Ma'ali by Dust Muhammad, a key formative work in the history of Mughal painting and one of the most important survivals from the Humayun or early Akbar period (estimate: £500,000-700,000); one of the earliest natural history studies Family of Cheetahs attributed to Basawan, who is considered Emperor Akbar's most innovative and expressive artist (estimate: £700,000-1,000,000); and the exquisite A Prince Hawking attributed to Muhammad Ali (estimate: £700,000-1,000,000); as well as Colonel Polier's Nautch by Mihr Chand, the opening folio of one of the Polier albums, which is a major work from the late Mughal tradition that represents the transition to increasing European patronage (estimate: £250,000-350,000). From the Deccan is an enchanting, dream-like Animals and Ascetics in a Landscape (estimate: £200,000-300,000).
From the Rajasthani schools is the intense and powerful Maharao Umed Singh of Kotah Hunting Tiger, one of the greatest examples of its kind (estimate: £200,000-300,000), and the monumental Durbar of Tansi Thakur Bagh Singh (estimate: £80,000-120,000). There is an exquisite group of Nayika paintings from the Pahari Hills by a master of the first generation after Manaku and Nainsukh (estimate: £100,000-150,000), and a highly important series of eight Sikh illustrations depicting the creation of Kashmir Shawls, commissioned specially for the 1867 Paris Exposition Universelle (with estimates from £60,000 to £120,000). Among a wealth of important works of the Company School are eight arresting group and single-figure portraits from the celebrated Fraser Album, including some of the best-known, such as Eight Horse Merchants (estimate: £500,000-800,000).
PERSIAN WORKS
Several highly significant Persian works of the Safavid School of the late 16th and 17th century include important single-figure studies signed by or attributed to artists including Mirza Ali, Shaykh Muhammad, Sadiqi Beg, Reza Abbasi, Muhammad Qasim and Mu'in Musavvir, with estimates ranging from £4,000 to £250,000.
PROVENANCE
Provenance is an important thread through the entire collection. The works were largely acquired between the early 1960s and 1980s, when a wealth of important material was available on the market from the great collections of the late 19th and 20th century, such as those of Baron Maurice de Rothschild (1881-1957), Octave Homberg (1876-1941), F. R. Martin (1868-1933), M. H. Sevadjian (1884-1933), A. C. Ardeshir (1885-1960), Hagop Kevorkian (1872-1962), E. Beghian (1877-1962), Dr. W. B. Manley (1885-1972), W. G. Archer (1907-1979), and Stuart Cary Welch (1928-2008).
Many of the paintings had historically interesting and important patrons and earlier provenances from the Mughal Emperors to Colonel Antoine-Louis Polier (1741-1795), John Wombwell (1748-1813), John and William Dent (1761-1833), Colonel James Skinner (1778-1841), William Fraser (1784-1835) and James Fraser (1783-1856), Sir Thomas Phillipps (1792-1872), and the Earls of Caledon.
Free and open for all to enjoy, sale highlights will be on view at Christie's in New York from 12 to 17 September, Zürich from 23 to 26 September and Dubai from 6 to 10 October, accompanied by Edward Wilkinson, Christie's newly appointed Global Head of Classical Indian, Himalayan and South East Asian Art (New York and Zürich), and Sara Plumbly (Zürich and Dubai). The full pre-sale exhibition at Christie's headquarters in London will run from 24 to 27 October. Exceptional Paintings from The Personal Collection of Prince & Princess Sadruddin Aga Khan on 28 October will be the centrepiece of Christie's Islamic and Indian Art Week, this Autumn, followed by the bi-annually anticipated sale of Art of the Islamic and Indian Worlds including Rugs and Carpets on 30 October.
