Canticle of the Birds Exhibition

The Conference of the Birds, 2025, blue Biro drawing by Jane Lee McCracken was commissioned by the Aga Khan Centre Gallery, London, for the Canticle of the Birds exhibition, 5 December 2025 to 31 May 2026. The exhibited artwork is a ceramic tiled panel featuring the original drawing.

The title of the drawing refers to the poem The Conference of the Birds by the Sufi poet Farid al-Din Attar. Jane took her visual inspiration from The Crow Addresses the Animals, an homage to Attar’s poem by the Mughal painter Miskin, c. 1590. 

In the poem the birds of the world gather for a conference with the hoopoe, their spiritual guide, who urges them to embark on a quest in search of the Simorgh – a mythical bird that represents the divine. The human-like foibles of a number of the birds are revealed in the excuses they make for not undertaking the quest. It is an arduous prospect, and only thirty birds complete it.

The Crow Addresses the Animals, miniature attributed to Miskin. Mughal, c. 1590. British Museum 1920,0917,0.5

In the drawing Jane imagines that some of the birds who declined to take part in the quest to find the Simorgh, including the peacock and the parrot, have found the courage to do so. She depicts the epic climax in which the birds find the Simorgh, flying towards it in a frenzy—all except the hoopoe, who remains serene in its wisdom.

Detail of a pharaoh owl, European roller, common pheasant and greater painted snipe

The following are eighteen bird types mentioned in the poem and included in the drawing, along with the species on which Jane based the images: Cock pheasant (common pheasant); Duck (ruddy shelduck); Hoopoe (Eurasian hoopoe); Falcon (lanner falcon); Finch (common rose finch); Francolin; Goldfinch; Parrot (rose-ringed parakeet); Hawk (lesser spotted eagle); Heron (purple heron); Nightingale (common nightingale); Osprey; Owl (pharaoh owl); Partridge (chukar); Peacock (Indian peafowl); Simorgh (golden eagle); Sparrow (saxaul sparrow); Turtle dove. The drawing includes an additional twelve species to represent the 30 birds that survived the quest in Attar's poem: Shaheen falcon (used by ancient Persians in falconry); European roller; greater painted snipe; purple sunbird; red collared-dove; common kingfisher; bearded vulture (vulnerable); Dalmatian pelican; white-rumped vulture (critically endangered); Iranian ground-jay (endemic); Eurasian golden oriole; Siberian crane (critically endangered). All these species and subspecies inhabit Iran apart from the Indian Peafowl. 

Other animals represented in the drawing include the leopard (vulnerable); lion (vulnerable); cheetah (vulnerable); tiger (endangered); Akhal Teke horse (a breed represented in Persian art); dhole (endangered); Indian wolf; and caracal.

Detail of hoopoe layered with drawings of a lion, Akhal Teke horse and white-rumped vulture

The golden eagle, believed to be the closest species to the Simorgh, is especially significant to Jane since golden eagles are cherished in Scotland; she has encountered golden eagles gliding above Loch Bay, Skye. The Simorgh is thought to be female—it has been depicted in Persian art with the head of a woman—and Jane's self-portrait, layered with the face of Iranian actress Golshifteh Farahaniof, appears on its wing in the drawing. 

The Eagle Huntress, Otto Bell’s 2016 film about thirteen-year-old Aisholpan, the first female eagle hunter in Mongolia, provided inspiration for the physique of the eagle as well as vividly portraying the challenges women face in an often male-dominated world. The film also suggested a link between Genghis Khan’s invasion of Iran and the killing of Attar by a Mongol horseman. 

Detail of the Simorgh

In mythology, the Simorgh’s tail is likened to that of a peacock; in the drawing the full body of the peacock appears, flying toward the Simorgh, its tail fusing with the body of the eagle. Giant peacock moths flutter over the Simorgh’s wing, symbolising the moth’s parable within Attar’s poem, in which moths fly into a flame in pursuit of divine love:

How can a moth flee fire/When fire contains its ultimate desire? And if we do not join/Him, yet we’ll burn/And it is this for which our spirits yearn.

To represent the use of patterns in Islamic art and echo her Dear Nightingale ceramic tile and drawing, created alongside the Dear Hoopoe ceramic tile and drawing for the 2021 Aga Khan Centre Gallery exhibition the Making of Paradise, Jane has woven into the drawing the pattern of a tile from the Shah-i-Zinda necropolis, Samarkand. On the bottom edge a break in the pattern symbolises the breakthrough the birds have made in overcoming their misgivings about the quest. They have achieved inner enlightenment in discovering that the Simorgh is a reflection of themselves.

Prints of the drawing will be available soon...