Saturday, December 22, 2007

Iranian Items at the Louvre

My sweetie and I spent time at the Louvre yesterday - completely exhausting and we didn't even spend the whole day touristing like folks on holiday do. These are some items from an area in present-day Iran.

A pot with flying geese:

Molded brick wall facings from a temple dedicated to Inshushinak, the god of the city of Susa and protector of the Shutrukides dynasty. Or something like that. 12th century B.C.


This is a dragon head architectural feature. Looks almost Central American.

Cuneiform inscriptions from the temple:


A stele.
Close-ups. I'd love to free-piece one of these, but I keep thinking of horror movies and how you do something stupid like that and free the god (or mummy) to wreak havoc upon the earth.



This is for you, Jen: a hedgehog pull-toy from the temple of Inshushinak.

Baked clay figurines from Susa of nude women. And I think my hips are wide.

Today my plan is to make the Christmas Biscotti recipe I got from Siobhan. Both my husband and I love these. Only I was stupid and didn't read the recipe clearly enough - I don't have baking powder. So I have to hunt for that today - could be scary, I expect the grocery stores to be packed.
You know how I was talking about suzanis the other day in my post about the cool store La Bonne Renommée? [By the way, here's a link to the store.] Well, Maryam has a pic of her suzanis (lucky, lucky girl) in her blog My Marrakech, which you should check out anyway if you like ethnic textiles and decorating because she has fabulous taste. Maryam's suzanis are featured here at Trendbites as well. I love the bright colors in her suzanis - pink and purple, woohoo.
And on the same topic, here's a blog post on suzanis from House Beautiful. The featured works are much more elaborate and quilty looking - check them out.

9 comments:

Clare said...

I love the fly geese pot - the wavy lines are more to my liking though LOL. The lady with the big hips is definitely me!

Have a great Christmas and New Year. What are you doing? Vegging out?

Bonne anneé et bonne santé (bisous on both cheeks à la française) and see you next year - hopefully!

Joyce said...

How nice to have a little visit to the Louvre without the crowds and sore feet. Thanks.

Maryam in Marrakesh said...

Thank you so much for the mention! Yay! And I am esp happy for a visit to the Louvre. I so much wanted to see this exhibit, as I watched a documentary about it and I am half Persian:-)

Tracey @ozcountryquiltingmum said...

Enjoyed that visit to the Louvre, thanks.
Your orphan train is looking good, great quilting...and great cats...our last kitten found a home today but looks like the other adult is not 'General Grievous' after all, but 'Padme'!! Too fat to jump on the bench so the house will not be free of kittens for long! I should never trust a cat seller!Tracey

Quilts And Pieces said...

I LOVE the pot! And I"m the lady on the left! I also noticed they are grabbing their chests - hmmm, trying to look bigger there? Only you would think of free pieceing those characters but thinking of releasing some monster! I thought that was great!

Unknown said...

Wow! Great post! The cuneiform writing--I would definitely like to see those free-pieced. I laughed at the idea of that unleashing a curse. LOL

And thanks for the link to My Marrakesh. I was just gasping at the photos of textiles and beads.

Susan said...

Thanks for sharing those pics. It's nice to know that if the middle east goes up, there will still be some history from that time left. Have a wonderful Christmas.

Holly said...

I'm the lady with the saddle-bag hips - *hehe*. Thanks for the pictures. Have a GREAT Christmas, Tonya! Curious what you will be doing.

Hedgehog said...

I love the hedgehog pic - thanks!! Belated Christmas and New Year greetings to you and yours.