Large Bowl From Sultanabad, Persian Kashan Safavide Ceramic, Soustiel, 14th Century

Rare large Safavid bowl or cup in the Sultanabad style, possibly Kashan Persian ceramic, decorated with stylized foliage alternating with flowers and geometric patterns, adorned with a beautiful rosette at the base. Provenance: private collection (possibly from the Muslim Art antique shop of Joseph Soustiel*), Persian Peninsula, 14th century. This bowl is in its original condition and shows signs of age. An old collector's label is on the base. This object comes from a private collection, some of whose pieces were purchased from Joseph Soustiel's Parisian shop (labels and numbers on the base). We have many other items from this collection for sale on this site. Please note: damage and restorations to the upper part, hairline cracks in the body, glaze defects, and signs of age; see photos. *Joseph Soustiel (1904-1990): Antique dealer and expert in Islamic art. Joseph Soustiel was the heir to a dynasty of antique dealers whose ancestors, Abraham and his grandfather Moses (1836-1916), founded an antique shop in Thessaloniki in 1883, with branches in Skopje (Üsküb), Sarajevo, and Istanbul. Thirteen years later, his father, Haim (1871-1939), settled in Istanbul, where he opened a shop in the Grand Bazaar (Tarakçılar Sokak), followed by a second in the Zincirli Khan in 1913. After completing his primary and secondary education at the Brothers' School in Thessaloniki and then at the German School in Istanbul, Joseph left the Ottoman capital in October 1921. While en route to Tunis aboard the Mega Hellas, a violent storm forced his ship to stop in Marseille. He took advantage of this to visit his uncle Albert in Paris. In 1926, he partnered with Berthe Léger-Eskénazi (d. 1929), an antique dealer located a short walk from the Hôtel Drouot, at 26 rue Grange-Batelière, and developed the business Art Musulman. In 1935, he married Irène Eskénazi, his partner's daughter, and that same year the young couple moved to 146 boulevard Haussmann. A perfect polyglot and a great connoisseur of Islamic art, he participated in the founding of the France-Turkey Committee in 1949 and, from 1952 onward, worked with Jean David-Weill to organize the first exhibition devoted to Turkish art at the Pavillon de Marsan of the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris (Splendor of Turkish Art, February-April 1953). His most cherished areas remained textiles and Islamic ceramics, to which he dedicated several articles. A patron of the arts, he was a generous donor who contributed to the enrichment of the Islamic collections of the Louvre, the National Ceramics Museum in Sèvres, the Museum of Decorative Arts, as well as numerous provincial museums, museums in Turkey (door of the Green Türbe and cradle of Sultan Mahmud II in the Bursa Museum), and museums around the world. Appointed a Knight of the Legion of Honour in 1977, he handed over his gallery to his son Jean in 1983. Frédéric Hitzel, CNRS / Entry published in François Pouillon (ed.), Dictionnaire des orientalistes de langue française, Editions Karthala, Paris, 2008, pp. 908-909. Dimensions: Diameter at the neck 22 cm, Diameter at the base 9.5 cm, Height 10.4 cm. All photos are available at: www.antiques-delaval.com