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Additional Views

Apr 23, 2013

Dec 8, 2009

Apr 23, 2013

Fragment with palmette arches with Alhambra wall pattern

1300s

Spain, Granada

Silk and gilt-metal thread: lampas weave

Overall: 48.3 x 25.4 cm (19 x 10 in.); Mounted: 58.1 x 35.2 cm (22 7/8 x 13 7/8 in.)

Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund 1939.35

Location

not on view

Description

This rare, gold-thread silk displays a sophisticated pattern that also decorates the stucco walls of the Alhambra, the imperial palace in Granada. Three superimposed designs form the harmonious pattern on the golden ground. Splitpalmette leaves in ivory or green silk form staggered arches displaying a crimson text, Good fortune, written in angular Arabic script with extended strokes that create secondary symmetrical arches. Deep blue palmette leaves create the third level of decoration. The interior walls of the Alhambra would have shimmered with these warm, patterned textiles.

Inscriptions

Inscription

horizontal rows of staggered arch-like forms enclose knotted and interlaced Kufic inscriptions: "Success."

Provenance

?-1939

(Estate of H. A. Elsberg, New York, NY, sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art)

1939-

The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH

Citations

Gertrude Underhill. "Textiles from Spain and Portugal Thirteenth to Sixteenth Centuries." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 16, no. 10 (1929): 183-91. p.184 www.jstor.org

Underhill, Gertrude. "Textiles from the H. A. Elsberg Collection." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 26, no. 9 (1939): 143-46. p. 143-6 www.jstor.org

Los Angeles County Museum. 2000 Years of Silk Weaving: An Exhibition Sponsored by the Los Angeles County Museum in Collaboration with the Cleveland Museum of Art and the Detroit Institute of Arts. 1944. p. 18, no. 125, pl. 35

Weibel, Adèle Coulin. Two Thousand Years of Textiles; The Figured Textiles of Europe and the Near East. New York: Published for the Detroit Institute of Arts [by] Pantheon Books, 1952. p. 105, no. 88

The Cleveland Museum of Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art Handbook. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1958. Mentioned and Reproduced: cat. no. 130 archive.org

The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1966. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1966. Reproduced: p. 220 archive.org

The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1969. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1969. Reproduced: p. 220 archive.org

The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1978. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1978. Reproduced: p. 277 archive.org

Mackie, Louise W. Symbols of Power: Luxury Textiles from Islamic Lands, 7th-21st Century. Cleveland; New Haven: Cleveland Museum of Art; Yale University Press, 2015. Reproduced: P. 199, fig. 5.31; Mentioned: P. 200

Blessing, Patricia."Draping, Wrapping, Hanging: Transposing Textile Materiality in the Middle Ages." The Textile Museum Journal 45, (2018): 2-21. Reproduced: p. 12, fig. 6

Exhibition history

Masterpieces of the Weavers' Art. Hackley Art Gallery, Muskegon, MI (October 7-November 3, 1957).

Gallery 207 textile rotation. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (June 19, 2001-June 3, 2002).

2000 Years of Silk Weaving. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (March 18-April 16, 1944).

Islamic Gallery 207 Rotation. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (June 19, 2001-June 3, 2002).

Luxuriance: Silks from Islamic Lands, 1250-1900. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (May 14, 2013-June 23, 2014).

Al-Andalus: Art from Islamic Spain (Islamic art rotation). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (October 29, 2019-October 25, 2020).

Cite this page

{{cite web|title=Fragment with palmette arches with Alhambra wall pattern|url=https://clevelandart.org/art/1939.35|year=1300s|access-date=20 March 2023|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

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Fragment with palmette arches with Alhambra wall pattern

Fragment with palmette arches with Alhambra wall pattern

Spain, Granada

Location

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