Abstract
This paper problematizes five central themes regarding Qajar art in general and erotic
representation in Qajar art in particular. The paper addresses the continued existence of the tropes that the Qajar era is not worthy of serious academic study; that concern with erotica was a unique Qajar elite concern resulting from their debased morality and that this was unique to the Qajar era; that erotica was a particularly Eastern, read Iranian, addiction in contra-distinction to the morally superior West (the colonialist and orientalist thesis); that erotic representation in paintings and other media specific to the early 19th century was accessible to a wider population; and finally, that Qajar art is not high art because high art is not hybrid art, that only pure indigenous art can be considered high art. Beyond addressing and countering these five themes, this paper concludes with a series of “coincidences” of artistic erotic representation between West and East (Europe and Qajar Iran), and suggests that these cannot simply be coincidences.

Keywords
Qajar era, Qajar art, Erotica, Religious art, Christian art, Islamic art, Mythology, Painting,
Photography, 19th century Persia, Orientalism, Westoxication, Colonialism, Post-colonialism.