IRAN AND THE WORLD IN THE SAFAVID AGE
Abstracts 

Abe, Mr. Katsuhiko (Ueno Gakuen University, Faculty of International Cultural Studies, Tokyo), Blue-and-white tiles from Kirman: Ceramic Production in Kirman and its Relation to China

This paper discusses the 'pictorial' aspect of Kirman tiles by analyzing its techniques and designs and places it within the context of the multicultural environment of Safavid Persia during the seventeenth century.

The city of Kirman in the Safavid period is regarded as a major centre for the manufacture of pottery, especially blue-and-white painted wares imitating Chinese porcelain. The city possesses several monuments such as the Masjid-i Jami' and the Masjid-i Imam built or restored during the seventeenth century, and decorated with tiles made using underglaze-painting techniques in cobalt on a white ground. This type of mural decoration is unusual for the period.

The underglaze-painting technique had been successfully employed in tilework in the fifteenth century in Syria, Egypt and the Timurid Empire, but during the Safavid period lost favour to the cuerda seca technique, as seen in various monuments in Isfahan. However, the underglaze-painted tiles of Kirman show such variety of motif and design, as well as sophisticated materials and techniques, that they are not to be considered as marginal works.

Several questions have to be raised here, concerning the origin and the attributes of Kirman underglaze-painted tiles. How and from where did the Kirman tile makers conceive the idea of making blue-and-white tiles, given that tiles of this type were not being used in Isfahan or elsewhere in Iran? And, how can one place them in the artistic environment of the Safavid period?

One of the approaches to these questions is the close observation of the tiles' designs and motifs. Their pictorial aspect indicates the relationship between painting on ceramics and paintings on paper. The introduction of blue-and-white tiles in Kirman is also connected to the making of other ceramics. Kirman was probably one of the major production centres for blue-and-white Persian wares. Both underglaze-painted tiles and ceramic vessels require careful production processes using the same materials, as well as the brush strokes of an expert hand to paint on a white surface. The use of brush techniques is common to these ceramics and to drawings and paintings. These features make Kirman blue-and-white tiles more 'pictorial' than tiles produced by other techniques.

In addition, the origin of the Kirman tiles must be considered within the cultural and artistic context of Safavid Iran. The network of Asian commercial routes through Kirman functioned as a medium for transferring ideas, as well as forms and materials, throughout the region where merchants from Europe and Asia travelled. This is the setting, which facilitated the spread of blue-and-white painted tiles as an element of mural decoration in Iran, the Netherlands and Portugal, as well as the Dutch and Portuguese settlements in Asia, during the seventeenth century.
 

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