From a collection of Syrian shawls and other antique textiles acquired in Turkey in September; silk embroidered suzani from Uzbekistan in niche form, perhaps related to a prayer mihrab. There is a similar example in Bishkek National Museum and an interesting article on this use of this type of suzani on Turkotek here: http://www.turkotek.com/salon_00051/salon.html

Hand made silk embroidery on a very finely woven, thin silk fabric composed of several panels stitched together. The silk fabric is fragile from age and ideally should be conserved by being backed with another fabric. The quality of the embroidered flower design is excellent, as are its colours which are bright and unfaded. There is some fading to the background silk fabric which has some holes and tears mainly at the edge (see last two photos in link below). An unusual and affordable antique silk suzani. Size 268cm x 170cm

For more photos please see: http://www.kilim.ie/TRIBAL_ART_AND_ANTIQUES/Pages/Antique_Uzbek_Mihrab_S...

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