Luster Bowl with Ibex (1000s): Art, History and Details

Luster Bowl with Ibex (1000s) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

The expensive and unpredictable luster technique was transmitted by Iraqi potters to the more prosperous Fatimid court in Cairo where it flourished from around 1000 until about 1171.

Object facts

• Title: Luster Bowl with Ibex
• Date: 1000s
• Culture: Egypt, Fustat (Old Cairo), Fatimid period (909–1171)
• Type: Ceramic
• Technique: earthenware with luster-painted design
• Dimensions: Overall: 9.6 x 24.7 cm (3 3/4 x 9 3/4 in.)
• Collection: Islamic Art
• Department: Islamic Art
• Accession number: 1944.477

A detail from the museum

Lusterware seems to have been a secret process, confined to a small number of craftsmen.

Collection credit

Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• Cox, Warren E. The Book of Pottery and Porcelain. New York: L. Lee and Shepard Co.; distributed by Crown Publishers, 1944.
• Hollis, Howard. “Two Fusṭāṭ Bowls.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art, vol. 32, no. 6, 1945, pp. 92, 94–95.
• Graves Margaret S. "Matter Transformed: The Wondrous Arts of Fire and Earth." In Wonders of Creation: Art, Science, and Innovation in the Islamic World, edited by Ladan Akbarnia, 167–183. San Diego: The San Diego Museum of Art, 2025.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.