The Tortoise Trainer by Osman Hamdi Bey

An old man in a red robe and turban bends over five tortoises munching green leaves, a ney flute in his hands and a drum hanging on his back. He is supposed to train them, and they are ignoring him completely. Osman Hamdi Bey's 1906 painting is usually read as a sly poke at how slowly the Ottoman Empire's reforms were moving. In 2004 the Pera Museum bought it for about $3.5 million, a record for a Turkish painting at auction that stood until 2019. Pera Museum, Istanbul.