Platter with Kufic Inscription
Persian Art: Before and After the Mongol Conquest, The University of Michigan Museum of Art, Ann Arbor, April 9-May 17, 1959, no. 66 as Plate.
Echoes: Islamic Art and Contemporary Artists, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri, August 31, 2013-April 27, 2014, no cat.
The humble material of clay has been transformed into an elegant platter through the painting of swirling foliated calligraphy and knotted latticework on a white ground. This type of ceramics is known as epigraphic ware, referring to the writing that formed the decoration. They were popular among merchant- and upper-class patrons in the Samanid era in Iran, who used inscribed ceramics at social banquets. The inscriptions frequently bestow blessings or refer to proper etiquette and intellectual pursuits. The inscription on this platter reads: “Blessings. Knowledge is an ornament of youth, intelligence is a crown of gold. Happiness."
With Heeramaneck Gallery, New York, by 1954;
Purchased from Heeramaneck Gallery by The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, 1954.
Oleb Grabar, Persian Art: Before and After the Mongol Conquest, exh. cat. (Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Museum of Art, 1959), 33, 61, fig. 66, (repro.).
Ross E. Taggart, ed., Handbook of the Collections in the William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 4th ed. (Kansas City, MO: William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 1959), 244, (repro.).
Ross E. Taggart and George L. McKenna, eds., Handbook of the Collections in The William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, Kansas City, Missouri, vol. 2, Art of the Orient, 5th ed. (Kansas City, MO: William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 1973), 156, (repro.).
Roger Ward and Patricia J. Fidler, eds., The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art: A Handbook of the Collection (New York: Hudson Hills Press, in association with Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 1993), 398, (repro.).
Deborah Emont Scott, ed., The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art: A Handbook of the Collection, 7th ed. (Kansas City, MO: Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2008), 24, fig. 4, (repro.).
