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Dish
Unknown - Enlarge image
Dish
- Place of origin:
Iznik, Turkey (made)
Turkey - Date:
ca. 1545-1555 (made)
- Artist/Maker:
Unknown (production)
- Materials and Techniques:
Fritware, underglaze painted in blue, turquoise and green, glazed
- Museum number:
1753-1892
- Gallery location:
Ceramics Study Galleries, Asia & Europe, room 137, case 28, shelf 5
The composition of spotted, fork-like tulips among slender stems of small white flowers relates this dish to the workshop of an Iznik potter. He is known from his signature on another piece as Musli. The gently foliated outline of the central area mirrors that of the rim of the bowl itself.
In the mid 15th century, potters in the small town of Iznik in north-west Anatolia specialised in modest earthenware imitations of Chinese blue-and-white porcelain. In the 1460s or 1470s, under the patronage of Sultan Mehmet the Conqueror, they began to manufacture bowls, dishes and other pieces of fritware. These were elegant in shape and decoration, and often very large.
