170-year-old paintings of Hungarian painter on display

LAHORE: After restoration and preservation of 170-year old paintings of Hungarian painter August Schoffet have been put on display at Sikh Gallery, Lahore Fort.

This task was completed by Archeology Directorate and Tourism Department in collaboration with Hungarian Embassy and Walled City Lahore Authority (WCLA). Paintings of Hungarian artist August Schoefft, who visited Lahore between 1841 and 1842, displayed in Princess Bamba Gallery at Lahore Fort.

According to historical accounts, Schoefft belonged to a family of artists. The street where he was born in 1809 is still known as ‘Képíró Utca’/Artists’. In November 1841, Schoefft arrived at the court of Maharaja Sher Singh, the openly anglophile successor of Maharaja Ranjit Singh. Schoefft completed a number of paintings for Sher Singh which he left behind in the royal Tosha Khana or treasury. Schoefft took away with him sketches of personalities he encountered in Lahore.

These paintings finally returned to Lahore when Princess Bamba Sutherland (Duleep Singh’s daughter) settled in Model Town, where she died in 1957. The government of Pakistan bought the collection from her legatee Pir Karim Bukhsh Supra. Since then they had been languishing in the Sikh Gallery. Secretary Tourism and Archaeology Department (TAD) Ehsan Bhutta said "For the last two years, through the concern of then Hungarian ambassador Istvan Szabo and his wife Emilia, the paintings are being preserved and displayed".