Beethoven in Harem

Artist: Halife Abdulmecid Efendi
Year: 1915
Place: Istanbul Art and Sculpture Museum, Istanbul

This painting shows us Abdulmecid Efendi’s interest in Western music, and this painting defends Westernism. With this painting it is shown to the viewer that Western culture has reached the harem of the prince; the courtiers perform and listen to Western music. There are three people playing an instrument in the picture: A woman is sitting at the piano, a man is accompanying her with the cello, and another woman is playing the violin. A man in a Pasha suit and three women, two of whom are standing, listen to the music. The name of Beethoven, who gave the painting its name, is written on the cover of the musical notebook on the floor. Just below the Ayvazovsky painting on the wall is a Beethoven bust. There is also a horse statue behind the woman playing the piano. This is the statue of Sultan Abdulaziz, which is in the Beylerbeyi Palace today. The space of the painting is the ground floor sofa of the Abdülmecid Efendi Mansion in Üsküdar.

In the painting, the person depicted by the painter Abdülmecid Efendi in a pasha uniform is himself. It is thought that the first wife of Abdülmecid Efendi, Şehsuvar Kadınefendi, who played the violin, Hatça Kadın, whose real name was Ophelia, was the first of the two young women standing on the left of the painting, Abdülmecid’s another wife, Mehisti Kadınefendi.

The work was featured in the Vienna Exhibition, the first exhibition in Europe by Turkish painters, along with three other paintings by Abdülmecid (others: ‘Self-Portrait’, ‘Sultan Selim I’, ‘Haremde Goethe’) [4] It is in the collection of the Istanbul Painting and Sculpture Museum.

Originial Text: https://tr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haremde_Beethoven

Translated by me