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Early Medieval Period: Art
Combining innovative styles,
techniques, and forms with previously conceived ones, early
medieval art is often marked by strong regional
characteristics. Compared with early Islamic art, works
of art from this period make much greater use of figural
decoration and forms.
The wealth and material prosperity enjoyed
by Fatimid Egypt and Syria during this period are
reflected in the opulence of the art. The Fatimids
evidently had a taste for meticulously fabricated goldwork and intricately carved vessels of rock crystal, a type of
transparent, colorless quartz whose surface can be brilliantly
burnished. One such rock crystal vessel in the museum’s collection is
decorated with abstract vegetal ornament that harks back to the Abbasid
period; its diminutive scale is remarkable given the complexities of
carving and polishing this hard stone (fig. 14).
Jewelry is an
important aspect of Islamic art, and the museum’s collection includes a
magnificent gold bracelet (fig. 15) that demonstrates the artistry
and luxury of Islamic goldworking techniques in the
Fatimid period. Fashioned from a single flat sheet of
gold, the shank of the bracelet was decorated with
repoussé and chased designs and then folded into a
hollow tube. Repoussé is a type of relief ornament that
is pushed out from behind; here the fine relief designs
include human heads, birds, and harpies (human-headed
birds). The decoration of the elaborate circular clasp
illustrates several complex techniques: twisted wire
spirals, granulation (decoration of the surface with tiny
spheroids or balls), and filigree (wire made into
decorative configurations). The stones are emeralds and
rubies; the latter have been set with rock crystal, a
favorite stone in the Fatimid period. Bracelets of this
type were evidently made and worn in pairs, further
magnifying the effect of the fine workmanship and
precious materials. Such gold jewelry served not only as
a spectacular form of personal adornment but also as an
indicator of a woman’s wealth and social standing.
Another measure of social status was
personal dress. Textiles from the first centuries of the Islamic era
survive mainly in the form of fragments, including tiraz, with their
characteristic embroidered or woven inscriptions supplying the name and
titles of the ruler. Such cloth, produced in state factories, would be
distributed by the reigning monarch to members of his court. A
remarkable tiraz in LACMA's collection (fig. 16) that testifies to the ecumenical nature of Fatmid society
bears a woven inscription in the names of the ruler al-'Aziz (r. 975–96)
and his chief minister or vizier Ibn Killis (served 977–90). Killis,
who was of Jewish origin, was famous for the financial reforms that
helped bring enormous prosperity to Egypt as well as to the vizier.
Under the Fatimids ceramics and
glassworking were also highly developed art forms.
Artisans of this period revived or continued earlier
techniques but gave them their own distinctive stamp.
The art of luster-painted ceramics was likely introduced in Egypt at
least by the early eleventh century. Fatimid lusterware is typically
decorated with figures, both human and animal, as can be seen in a bowl
with four golden fish alternating with an inscription repeating the
Arabic word for prosperity, on an opaque turquoise ground (fig. 17). Several glass objects of
the period are included in the collection, notably a small flask with
handles, representing the revival and adaptation of a highly decorative
ancient Egyptian glass technique called marvered and combed glass
(fig.18). On this example opaque white glass thread was trailed around and then marvered, or pressed,
into the blackish purple glass of the flask; the glass thread was then
combed, producing a distinctive featherlike pattern. Finally, opaque
turquoise glass thread was trailed around the rim of the flask.
The art of Islamic Spain
during this period is somewhat less inventive and
energetic than that produced elsewhere, which may have to
do with the relative isolation of Spain and North Africa
under conservative Almoravid and Almohad rule. Perhaps on account of the
mood of uncertainty created by the Christian reconquest,
which had already succeeded in severely curtailing the
areas of Muslim rule, the art of the eleventh and twelfth
centuries seems to look backward to earlier masterpieces
of the Islamic golden age in Spain in the ninth and tenth
centuries. This later art draws on traditional forms,
materials, and techniques, further refining an earlier
decorative idiom. Evidence of this is found in
architectural decoration, decorative arts (such as
textiles), and calligraphy.
One such example in the
museum’s collection is a bifolio or double page from a manuscript of
the Qur'an, datable to the thirteenth century (fig. 19). Although parchment had already begun to
pass out of vogue elsewhere in the Islamic world, this bifolio, copied in gold ink on parchment, reflects the
conservative nature of Spain in the early medieval period, as does its distinctive script. Known as Maghribi, after the region of North Africa that roughly
encompasses modern Morocco, this cursive script is a
direct descendent of Kufic. While retaining some of the
solemnity and grandeur of the earlier rectilinear script,
Maghribi incorporates graceful, deeply curved lines. It
developed in the early twelfth century in both Spain and
North Africa, and its use is restricted to these regions.
Roughly contemporary with the bifolio
from the Qur'an is an astronomical instrument known as an astrolabe, a
device Muslims inherited from the Hellenistic world and then passed on
to medieval Europe. According to its inscriptions, this handsome
gilt brass astrolabe was made in Seville, in southern Spain (fig. 20). Like all such
instruments, it was designed to measure the altitude of the stars, sun,
or moon, and to establish different astronomical and topographical
associations without resorting to calculations or formulas. It was
especially valuable for timekeeping, as the Muslim times of prayer are
astronomically determined. In addition to being functional, the
astrolabe was also intended to be beautiful. This example is unusual in
that it seems to have been altered nearly seventy years after it was
made, possibly in Egypt or Syria; Seville had by that time already
fallen to the Christian reconquest.
In Iran the waves of
Turkish tribes that had emigrated from the Central Asian
steppe adopted Persian language and culture, which they
patronized and invigorated. The great flowering of the
arts in this period has more to do with the Turkish
ruling elite’s appetite for Persian culture than
with their own ethnicity. Architectural decoration, the
arts of the book, textiles, glass, metalwork, and pottery
all attained a high level, enriched by a decorative
vocabulary that was frequently dominated by figural
representation. Figurative decoration was so prevalent
that it even transformed Arabic inscriptions, which came
to be inhabited by humans and animals, while the letters
themselves were at times transfigured into creatures.
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This predilection for
"animated" writing did not affect inscriptions
produced for a religious context, which, when written in Kufic, were also transformed or embellished, but by
abstract, vegetal designs (foliated Kufic) or by
interlacing the shafts of the vertical letters (plaited
Kufic). For example, a tall carved marble slab from the
mid-twelfth century, which is covered by bands of
epigraphic decoration, is inscribed with different types
of foliated Kufic as well as with the cursive Naskhi script (fig. 21). The viewer
need not be able to read Arabic (still the primary language for
religious and dedicatory inscriptions in Iran) to appreciate the
monumental beauty of these scripts or to note the rich
complexity of the different decorative transformations of
the letters in the outer epigraphic bands. It is unclear whether this
stone panel functioned as a tombstone or a mihrab (prayer
niche), a characteristic element in mosques and other
religious edifices. The mihrab is usually concave, but flat examples also occur. In
fact, one is depicted at the center of this panel (they
are also a common form of decoration on tombstones). The
carved inscriptions that fill and surround the central
niche may provide a clue to the panel’s purpose.
They include quotations from the Qur'an, one of which
refers to the act of prayer, suggesting that this object
originally functioned as a mihrab. The elegant Kufic
inscription at the base of the stone provides the
signature of the artist, cAli Ahmad ibn (son
of) Abu’l-Qasim al-Kharrat. His father,
Abu’l-Qasim al-Kharrat, was also a stone-carver, and
his signature is preserved on two marble tombstones.
Ceramic wares of this
period demonstrate the continued refinement of earlier
techniques as well as the development of new ones. A type
of artificial ceramic body known as fritware was
developed, perhaps in the eleventh century, which was to
be of signal importance to the history of Islamic
pottery. Intended to approximate the white color and
light weight of Chinese porcelain, fritware is an amalgam
of silica (e.g., ground quartz), glass frit (partially
fused glass), and a small proportion of fine white clay.
This technologically sophisticated and aesthetically
appealing ceramic ware soon supplanted the darker and
heavier earthenware as the preferred material of most
Islamic potters.
Luster-painted
pottery, first developed in Iraq in the ninth century,
was produced in Egypt and Syria under the Fatimids, and
by the second half of the twelfth century it had reached
Iran, where it achieved new heights. The center for this
ceramic industry in Iran was the city of Kashan, where
the recipe for this complicated technique must have been
well guarded, shared by only a few families of potters.
Lusterware, primarily vessels and tiles for architectural
revetment (wall facing), was made in Kashan into the
fourteenth century, its production apparently undisturbed
by the Mongol invasions of the thirteenth century.
Hallmarks of the Kashan style include the use of plump
birds, both standing and in flight, and tiny spiral and
commalike patterns scratched through the lustered surface, employed as a background or filler
motif. Figural imagery abounds among these lusterwares,
and when animals are represented, they are very often
depicted with decorative spots, regardless of the
appropriateness to the species. Several other closely
related styles were also produced at Kashan.
The museum’s collection is particularly rich in lusterware from Kashan. Among the finest and most visually appealing of
these pieces is a bowl with pale blue glaze, overpainted with chocolate
brown luster (fig. 22). At the center of the bowl is a monumental
spotted bear, reserved (depicted in silhouette) against
the luster ground. The animal’s form and proportions
are well suited to the contours of the vessel. As is
typical of wares decorated with a single, large figure,
the remaining background space is filled by curled palmette leaves.
A new type of luxury
ceramic notable for its multicolored figural decoration
was introduced in Iran during the second half of the
twelfth century. The polychrome surface was produced
through a costly and complicated double firing similar to
the luster painting technique, and in fact both wares are
attributable to Kashan, where they may have been made by
some of the same potters, in the same workshops. In this
process, which modern scholars often refer to as mina’i (from the Persian word for "enamel"), a ceramic
vessel was covered with a white or a turquoise opaque
glaze and then fired. The decoration was applied both
under and over the glaze. Stable colors such as cobalt
blue and turquoise, which could be fired successfully at
a high temperature, were applied under the glaze before
the first firing. The less stable colors — including red,
black, and gold — were applied to the cold glazed surface
and fixed in a second firing at a lower temperature.
The lively figural designs
that characterize mina’i ware sometimes include complicated
narrative scenes, some of which clearly refer
to Persian literature, specifically the Shahnama,
or Book of Kings, the Iranian national epic. In other instances these
wares are decorated with horsemen, or seated and standing princes,
courtiers, and entertainers, often clad in boldly patterned costumes. An
excellent and well-preserved example of the latter type of mina'i is the elegant ewer decorated with small, delicately painted horsemen in
the upper register, and seated courtiers, a musician, and perhaps a
dancer in the lower band (fig. 23).
The exact meaning of these figures, which seem to represent the "good
life," has yet to be deciphered. Mina'i ware was apparently not
produced after the thirteenth century, although it remains one of the
best-known and most popular types of medieval Iranian ceramics.
Metalwork of this period
also demonstrates a refinement and a surpassing of
earlier techniques. The inlaying of bronze or brass with
precious metals was practiced in the early Islamic
period, but on a limited scale. In the early medieval
period metalworkers began to cover large areas of the
base metal surface with decoration inlaid in copper and
silver, gold and silver, or silver alone, perhaps as a
less costly means of imitating the richness of objects
fashioned entirely of precious metal. Objects such as
candlesticks, pen-cases, inkwells, and a large variety of
vessel types were decorated with this technique, which
seems to have emerged in the eastern Iranian region in
the second half of the twelfth century. Wire and very
fine pieces of precious metal were inserted into designs
cut into the surface of the object; the precious metal
was then generally decorated with finer details. Figural
decoration; scenes of feasting, hunting, and other forms
of entertainment; and astrological symbols were the most
common types of ornament. Such objects were also
decorated with Arabic inscriptions written in animated
script.
A silver-inlaid brass
candlestick in the collection (fig.
24) demonstrates this type of
decoration and technique. Its base is circumscribed by a
band of alternating figural medallions and epigraphic
cartouches. The latter are filled with animated Naskhi
and animated and plaited Kufic inscriptions. Stylized
faces surmount the shafts of the vertical letters of the
Naskhi inscription or are arranged along
the top of the plaited Kufic inscription. As is typical,
these inscriptions offer a series of good wishes to the
unnamed owner of the candlestick. Each of the four
medallions encloses a seated reveler or musician, part of
the imagery associated with a feast, one of whom is shown
with a raised beaker. The motif of the seated or
enthroned figure raising a drinking vessel occurs
frequently in Islamic art and is a part of the larger
theme of courtly feasting and entertainment.
The beaker held by the small seated reveler on the
candlestick is of a common shape, one that is found in contemporary
glass, including an example in the museum’s collection (fig. 25). Although this specific type of
vessel was evidently known throughout large areas of the
Islamic world, the museum’s delicate glass beaker
was most likely produced in the eastern Mediterranean
during the period of Ayyubid rule. Part of its beauty stems from the way
the shape and decoration work together to suggest a
monumentality that belies its diminutive scale. The
opaque blue glass is decorated with vertical ribs that
alternate with marvered opaque white glass threads, and a
white glass thread is trailed around the rim of the
vessel. The beaker is an elegant reinterpretation of
techniques practiced in slightly earlier Fatimid glass,
discussed above. The collection includes other examples of Ayyubid
glass, such as a small but elegant lamp (fig. 26), whose distinctive form would be echoed in the brilliant
enameled glass lamps in
the succeeding late medieval period, under the Mamluk
dynasty (fig. 37).
Image in top banner:
Ewer, Iran, late twelfth to early thirteenth century; fritware, overglaze painted (mina'i); height: 13 in. (33.0 cm); The Madina Collection of Islamic Art, gift of Camilla Chandler Frost, M.2002.1.7
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art collection at LACMA
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Late Medieval Period: History
