Marcella Sirhandi

author of Royal Nepal: Through the Lens of Richard Gordon Matzene

November 4, 2015

Marcella Sirhandi is a specialist in 20th century and contemporary art of South Asia, with 3 books on Indian and Pakistani artists, a book on the history of modern and contemporary Pakistani art and 4 catalogs on Indian and Pakistani art and artists. She is currently working on 2 books: Social/Political Content in Neo-Miniature Painting in Pakistan and The Art of Mohan Samant

A New York painter born in Mumbai, India, Richard Matzene was only the 27th foreigner ever to enter the closed borders of Nepal. Invited in 1930 by the Prime Minister, whose ancestors had deposed the king and had de facto control of the country, Matzene won royal trust with his charismatic personality and admiration for his photographic talent. Already one of American's greatest portrait photographers of the 1920s, Matzene chose Ponca City as his home in 1926. Sirhandi located descendents who identified all photographs on her 2007 trip to Kathmandu. She recorded anecdotes and family secrets, as well as the political and cultural context of Nepal's ruling class in an environment of court intrigue, fratricide and the highly ritualized Hindu society.

URL: https://library.okstate.edu/news/celebratingbooks/2010-honorees/marcella-sirhandi

Last Updated: 14 January 2022