cat ride

Purchase — Charles Lang Freer Endowment
https://www.freersackler.si.edu/object/F1953.31/

Leave it to the cat to find the warmest, cushiest seat handy, even if it's on the human.  This work by the great Persian miniaturist Reza Abbasi (c. 1565-1635) is titled "Man with Cat," and though it measures merely 3 11/16" x 2 x 1/16" it has a snug presence. Abbasi was celebrated for the grace and versatility of his lines, and you can see that very well here. Compare the bold strokes that establish the man's body with the sketched, washed lines of the tree, and then the incredibly fine work of the cat's face as he savors his perch.

bunny bowl, 12thc iran

Photo credit: Yale University Art Gallery.  Hobart and Edward Small Moore Memorial Collection, Gift of Mrs. William H. Moore

This bowl measures 3 3/8 x 7 3/16 in. (8.5 x 18.2 cm), a good size for soup or a salad, perhaps.  I wonder who owned this bowl back in 12th-century Iran, what they liked best to have served in it, and whether they asked specially to have such a graceful, vine-entwined rabbit painted on it.  It was made in Seljuk Period Iran (1038-1194), a period of prosperity and thriving arts (here's the Metropolitan Museum of Art on that).  I was also able to find a reference that suggests the rabbit/vine motif celebrates the goodness of life now and to come. 

a golden bird in your ear

www.metmuseum.org Rogers Fund, 1922

I have a fanciful thought that perhaps some lover in 11th - 12th century Iran gave these earrings to a beloved, the better to symbolize sweet words chirped in their ears.  Look at the intricacy of the golden scrollwork and granulation (where the little dots are applied).  All that, in a bird only 1.25 inch tall. 
Various birds were of importance in Iranian mythology.  Doves were symbols of love, and also religious messengers; peacocks were royal birds; falcons are a central image of Zoroastrian iconography.  According to this page, birds in general also evoked freedom.  What freedoms were part of wearing these earrings, I wonder?  Freedom to choose a lover?  Freedom of spirit?  Someone wore these once, and I can't help but wish I knew their particular story.

wrapped in nightingales?

gift of W. T. Sesnon (M.55.6) www.lacma.org

Perhaps this textile wouldn't be so comfortable for a nap or for loungewear, as it contains metallic threads along its silk ones.  Even so, looking at this 17th-century Iranian textile brings soothing thoughts of perfumed gardens and birdsong, as if you could drape it around yourself and be transported there.  I believe this to be a variant of a pattern popular in its time, the "rose and nightingale" motif (gul-o-bul-bul), which symbolized the union of the lover and the beloved.  I know the birds look a lot like sun conures, but take a peek at this print from the Met for a gul-o-bul-bul motif that does essentially look a lot like this.  The Met also has an informative article about Iranian textiles of this period that I found interesting.