This is one of Osman Hamdi Bey’s unsigned and undated paintings. The outer wall of an old Ottoman building, its window with a pediment of tiles and geometric decorations with iron lattice, a shade fixed to the lattice and wall, and two women dictating a letter to the petitioner sitting under the shade are depicted.
The panel in the painting which is not in place today is shown in Léon Parvillée’s book Architecture et Décoration Turques (1874). It is a piece from the outer window pediment of Prince Mustafa’s Tomb within the Muradiye complex in Bursa. Clearly, Osman Hamdi Bey knew the building in Bursa well and had Parvillée’s book in his library.
Tile is a decorative element Osman Hamdi Bey frequently used especially in his later paintings. There are samples of Iznik tiles in some of his paintings and borders decorated with flowers or tiles decorated with calligraphy in others. Tiles can also be seen in the decorations of the religious buildings he has depicted.
Most of the women Osman Hamdi Bey frequently depicted belong to the higher income group as can be seen from their colorful and laced dresses which partly show their body contours reflecting the European fashion of the period. However, the two female figures in the Petitioner, one in blue and the other in black, are the ones closest to commoners compared to others in his paintings.
The petitioner after whom the painting is named is, as is frequently the case in Osman Hamdi Bey’s paintings, sitting on a Persian rug on a low wooden cot with thin legs, gazing at the sheet in his hand, with his writing box in front of him. He has a loose long-sleeved caftan over his yellow gown. There is a medal pattern ornamented with rather big flowers in the caftan’s fabric. The feet and gown of the petitioner are unfinished, like the Hodja Reading the Koran painting.
We also see two of the stray dogs frequently seen in the streets of the 19th century Istanbul, but very rarely in Osman Hamdi Bey’s paintings.
