Carpet in the "Polonaise" Style
Exhibition of Persian Art, The Iranian Institute, New York, April 15-May 15, 1940, gallery 4, no. 9 as Silk and Metal Thread Floral and Arabesque Carpet.
Iranian Art, Asia Institute, New York, December 1949-January 1950; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, February 9-March 31, 1950, no cat.
The Taste of Connoisseurs: A loan exhibition for the benefit of Spence-Chapin Adoption Service, French and Company, New York, October 7-Octobre 25, 1958, hors cat.
Persian Miniatures and Rugs: Demirdjian Collection, M. H. DeYoung Memorial Museum, San Francisco, California, December 10, 1958-January 6, 1959, no cat.
Weaving Splendor: Treasures of Asian Textiles, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, September 25, 2021–March 6, 2022, no cat.
Like the medallion carpet on display nearby, this monumental carpet was made in royal workshops during the reign of the Safavid ruler Shah ′Abbas I (ruled 1587–1628). The carpet is filled with vibrant decoration, as flower blossoms, scrolling vines, and curling, serrated leaves emanate from a central lobed medallion. Most luxury carpets of this type left Iran as diplomatic gifts or custom orders for aristocratic patrons. These carpets were erroneously called "Polonaise" because a Polish prince lent one of his family’s carpets to the 1887 Universal Exposition in Paris. Scholars misidentified the textile, which had the prince’s family crest added to it, as being Polish rather than Iranian.
Similar "Polonaise" carpets functioned as the Coronation Carpets in the Rosenborg Palace in Denmark and were placed under Louis XIV’s throne in Versailles, France.
Abruzzi collection, Florence [1];
Benguiat collection, New York, Paris, Florence, by 1932;
Purchased at their sale, Rare Eastern Carpets of the XVI and XVII Centuries, American Art Association, Anderson Galleries, Inc., New York, April 23, 1932, lot 20 as Superb “Polonaise” Gold- and Silver-Woven Silk Rug, by French and Company, New York, stock no. 38807, 1932-1933 [2];
Purchased from French and Company, through Harold Woodbury Parsons, by The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, 1933 [3].
NOTES:
[1] Rare Eastern Carpets of the XVI and XVII Centuries (New York: American Art Association, 1932), 24-25.
[2] Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles, French and Company Stock Sheets, box 45, folder 1.
[3] NAMA Archives, RG01-01, Box 1, Folder 17, letter from Mitchell Samuels to Paul Gardner, February 14, 1933.
Rare Eastern Carpets of the XVI and XVII Centuries (New York: American Art Association Anderson Galleries, Inc., 1932), forward, 24-26, plate 20, (repro.).
The William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, Handbook of the William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art (Kansas City, MO: William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 1933), 87, (repro.).
“The William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art, Kansas City Special Number,” Art News 32, no. 10 (December 9, 1933): 70, (repro.).
Phyllis Ackerman, Guide to the Exhibition of Persian Art, exh. cat. (New York: The Iranian Institute, 1940), 61, 63.
The William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, The William Rockhill Nelson Collection, 2nd ed. (Kansas City, MO: William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 1941), 136, (repro.).
Arthur Upham Pope, Masterpieces of Persian Art (New York: The Dryden Press, 1945), 184, 194, pl. 145, (repro.).
The William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, The William Rockhill Nelson Collection, 3rd ed. (Kansas City, MO: William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 1949), 179, (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), 252, (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), 166, (repro.).
Walter B. Denny, Oriental Rugs (U.S.A.: Smithsonian Institution, 1979), 36-38, pl. 22, (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), 405, (repro.).
Laura Spencer, "'A Carpet Made for Kings' nd Other Asian Textiles that Nelson-Atkins curators Don't Want You to Miss," KCUR, published September 24, 2021, https://www.kcur.org/arts-life/2021-09-24/a-carpet-made-for-kings-and-other-asian-textiles-that-nelson-atkins-curators-want-you-to-see.
Michele Valentine, “Illuminated by the Loom,” Hali 209 (Autumn 2021): 62, 66, (repro.).
Kimberly Masteller, “From Court to Marketplace: Persian and Indian Textiles in the Nelson-Atkins Collection and their Foreign Collectors,” Orientations 53, no. 3 (May/June 2022): 52-54, (repro.).
Ling-en Lu, Yayoi Shinoda, and Kimberly Masteller, “'Weaving Splendor: Treasures of Asian Textiles" and the Collections of Asian Textiles at The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art,” Orientations 53, no. 3 (May/June 2022): 30, (repro.).
