In Islamic culture, gift-giving is an art

Beyond its apparent beauty, Islamic art isn't always easy for Westerners to understand.

Leave it to a new exhibition at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art to shed light on its symbolism in the context of gift giving.

"Some of the best examples of Islamic art were made as gifts or repurposed as gifts," says Linda Komaroff, curator of the major international exhibition "Gifts of the Sultan: The Arts of Giving at the Islamic Courts," now on view through Sept. 5.

The thematic show spans the eighth to the beginning of the 20th centuries and features more than 250 works of art made of rare and precious materials and commissioned from the best artists and craftsmen of the day. These gifts came in many forms, including Chinese blue and white tableware, silk carpets, richly illuminated Qurans, enameled and gilded glass and jewel-encrusted armor.

From the personal to the pious to the diplomatic, "Gifts of the Sultan" demonstrates the nature of gift giving in the Islamic world, from southern Spain to northern India.

But there is no set path for visitors to follow in this exhibition.

"You're simply meant to let your eye lead you around to whatever you find beautiful," Komaroff says, passing through an Islamic arch into an octagonal enclosure near the entrance of the exhibition.

The area creates a sense of intimacy for the types of gifts that would have been exchanged between individuals and rarely, if ever, documented.

"It's very hard to find documentation for personal types of gifts, but we know, for instance, that gold bracelets made in pairs in Egypt in the early medieval period were a key gift for a bride's dowry," Komaroff says. "Her parents would give them to her, and we know they belonged to her throughout her lifetime."

Such pairs of 11th-century gold bracelets are seen in a wall case alongside earrings and an embellished comb, as well as a few examples of belts that surround a Persian manuscript illustration - titled "Rudaba Receives a Belt as a Gift from Zal's Messenger," dated 1576-77 - showing a belt being presented.

Outside the octagonal room's walls, the gallery opens up to the famous Ardabil Carpet, dated 1539-40, one of two matching royal carpets believed to have been commissioned by Shah Tahmasp for his ancestral shrine in northwestern Iran.

And it's hard to ignore the continuous projection of newsreel footage from the 1920s through '40s, which corresponds to a selection of 19th-century textiles with silk applique on the opposite wall.

"These are textiles that were made annually and sent to Mecca to dress the Kaaba (Islam's holy temple) in beautiful cloth," Komaroff says, adding that the newsreel shows the "parading of these textiles in Cairo before they're sent to Mecca."

Deeper into the exhibition, where the focus is on the grandeur of state and diplomatic gifts, a limestone rosette from the Mshatta Facade that dates back to the eighth century in what is now modern-day Jordan is installed in a wall.

The thick section comes from an elaborately carved entrance facade of an early Islamic palace. In 1903, it was disassembled, crated and transported by rail to Germany as a gift to Wilhelm II from the Ottoman Sultan Abdulhamid II.

"It's probably the largest- scale gift that anybody has ever given," Komaroff says.

Fath Ali Shah of Iran sent many portraits of himself abroad as gifts as a show of Persian royal power at a time when England and Russia were trying to influence Iran.

The exhibit features two such portraits, including one sent to Napoleon in 1806 that depicts the long-bearded Shah - many of whose descendants live in Los Angeles today - seated on a throne wearing his crown.

But not all gifts were well received.

There's the dark green kaftan given by Iranian Shah Muhammad Khudabanda to the Ottoman Sultan Murad III in 1583. The luxurious robe decorated with elaborate borders in metallic thread and applique medallions features a turban-wearing Persian figure in one of the medallions.

"It was suggested by a colleague of mine that this was not to Turkish taste, which is why it survived in such good condition - most likely, it was never worn," she says, adding that the Ottomans preferred large-scale patterns that could be seen from a distance "so you could pick out who the most important person was."

The exhibition showcases several examples, including a 16th- to 17th-century Ottoman saddlecloth woven in stylized carnations and tulips and artichoke-like flowers that would have come with a horse.

Large animals such as horses, elephants and giraffes were favorite gifts to and from Islamic courts. Another curiosity was the rhinoceros, immortalized here in a 16th-century print by the German artist Albrecht D rer.

The rhinoceros was based on the story of a rhinoceros gift that was regifted by notables from India to Portugal to Italy.

In 1815, en route to Rome, it drowned in a shipwreck.

"One account says they dredged him up and stuffed him, and sent him to the Vatican, anyway," Komaroff says. "I don't know. Somewhere there's a stuffed rhinoceros someone will come across someday."

Source: http://www.dailynews.com/news/ci_18206308?source=rss

Elisha Cuthbert Natalie Portman Nikki Cox Rebecca Romijn Laetitia Casta