Open full image Pin

Yar hudgi

Charles Frederick Brockdorff

1832

watercolor

From the collection of Victoria and Albert Museum

Romanticism Early 19th Century Allegory

Dominant colour

Yar hudgi is a 1832 watercolor by Charles Frederick Brockdorff, a Romanticism work, held at Victoria and Albert Museum.

Who painted this?: Charles Frederick Brockdorff
When & what style?: 1832 · Romanticism
Where can I see it?: Victoria and Albert Museum

About this work

This drawing shows a man in old-fashioned clothes holding a balance scale. The scale’s pans hold small round objects—maybe coins or weights. He wears a red hat, a striped shirt, and blue pants, with a serious look on his face. The background is plain white, so all the focus is on him and the scale. The artist drew this as a simple but clear picture, using flat colors and clean lines. The man’s pose and the scale might hint at fairness or justice, but it’s not obvious. If you like this style, check out Romanticism next.

The story of this work

Overview

The watercolour *Yar hudgi* is part of an album containing 54 sketches depicting Turkish figures and objects, with 41 attributed to Charles Frederick Brockdorff and 13 to other artists. The album consists of 116 pages, with sketches mounted on paper of varying colors and half-bound in morocco, featuring gilt lettering on the spine. The work is contextualized within a broader tradition of similar albums, such as those in the Victoria and Albert Museum, which include comparable drawings and titles in French and Turkish. Some figures also appear in albums by Lt. Col. Charles Hamilton Smith.

Read the full account in the museum source.