Dr. Kiras Perincek (Bogacizi University, Istanbul): From China to Europe: the Travel of 14th/15th Century Paintings

The so-called Mehmet Siyah Kalem paintings, were produced on paper with brush and ink in a Chinese hinterland near Central Asia, during the 14th and 15th centuries. These paintings depicted scenes from folk stories, and they were cut and pasted into two albums in the Aqqoyunlu palace in Tabriz. They are brought by the Ottomans to Istanbul after the conquest of Tabriz at the beginning of the 16th century.

Most of them kept now in Topkapi Palace Library in Istanbul, they reflect the intercultural relations along the Silk Road during the Middle Ages, in terms of both artistic and narrative elements. They consist a case of mobility where the art subject, the artist, the artisanship, the artwork are all mobile during the Middle Ages along the Silk Road. Purchased by European collectors in the 1900s, some pieces traveled also further west from Istanbul.