Towel
1750–1850
- Medium
- Cotton, plain weave with supplementary brocading wefts; embroidered with silk and metal-strip-wrapped silk
- Classification
- Textile
- Dimensions
- 161.9 × 56.3 cm (63 3/4 × 22 1/4 in.)
- Culture
- Turkey
- Museum
- Art Institute of Chicago, Textiles
- Credit line
- Gift of Burton Y. Berry
- Rights
- Public domain (CC0), as the museum states it.
- Who can see it
- Little Ones profiles and older: it shows gentle subjects for the very young. How works are placed
View at the Art Institute of Chicago
About this work
During the 17th century, Ottoman artists in Turkey developed a taste for flowers presented in clusters and in profile—a trend also seen in works made by the Safavids, in Iran, and the Mughals, in India. The motif can be traced to the introduction of European herbals, books that illustrated flowers in this fashion. This particularly sumptuous example has a ground fabric, usually plain in Turkish production, which was woven with a subtle and beautiful repeat pattern of diamonds.
Description © Art Institute of Chicago, CC BY 4.0
