Lamp12th-13th century

Not on view

Ancient glass vessel with flared mouth, bulbous midsection, and pedestal foot, covered in iridescent rust, tan, and pearlescent weathering over pale green glass

Blown glass vessel with a bulbous body, wide flared rim, and splayed foot, green glass heavily weathered with iridescent gold and tan encrustation across the entire surface.

Title: Lamp
Place Made: Syria or Egypt
Date Made: 12th-13th century
Medium: Glass, applied handles
Dimensions: 5 1/4 x 3 3/4 in. (13.34 x 9.53 cm)
Credit Line: The Madina Collection of Islamic Art, gift of Camilla Chandler Frost
Accession Number: M.2002.1.13
Classification: Glass
Collecting Area: Art of the Middle East: Islamic
Curatorial Notes: Lighting is an essential requirement of daily life in all times and places. In the early and medieval Islamic periods, glass lamps were used to illuminate small private spaces or, if grouped together, a larger public space such as a mosque. Likely intended for personal use, this lamp, with its bulbous body and flaring neck, has a distinctive shape that continued in later Islamic times and was especially popular for so-called mosque lamps from fourteenth-century Egypt, where they were enlarged and embellished with gilding and enameling, and suspended from the ceiling (see
Selected Bibliography: Atil, Esin. Renaissance of Islam: Art of the Mamluks. Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1981.
Komaroff, Linda. Islamic Art at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Los Angeles: Museum Associates, 2005.
Lo Terrenal y lo Divino: Arte Islámico siglos VII al XIX Colección del Museo de Arte del Condado de Los Ángeles. Santiago: Centro Cultural La Moneda, 2015.
Komaroff, Linda. Beauty and Identity: Islamic Art from the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Los Angeles: Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 2016.

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