Investigating the art of portraiture, one of the fundamental artistic expressions engaged with a range of artistic forms, deems crucial. Portraiture, in different forms, offers recognizable likeness of a given character with various political and social functions. As such, it is promising to study the aspects of the portraiture functions. Due to our being unfamiliar with this artistic medium, it is commonly believed in Iran that portraiture is a Western artistic form incompatible with our local aesthetics. The present article seeks to bridge the gap and deepen the readers' understanding of portraiture in paintings, mainly through reviewing its functions.