Textile with Phoenixes and Dragons
Unknown Artist
1279–1368
Medium
Silk and gold thread; lampas
Dimensions
20.3 × 20 cm · mounted: 31.4 × 31.1 cm
Classification
Textile
Department
Textiles
Museum
Cleveland Museum of Art
Credit
Edward L. Whittemore Fund
Accession Number
1995.73
About this artwork
This is one of the very few northern Chinese silk and gold textiles to have survived from the Yuan dynasty. The curled dragons chasing pearls, the phoenixes, and the background of tiny hexagons are Chinese motifs, but the lobed roundels enclosing the dragons and phoenixes indicate the influence of eastern Iranian craftsmen who had been relocated to northern China. A red and gold silk woven with the same pattern is preserved in Beijing. The extraordinary survival of the two silks demonstrates tha...