Glazed pottery from the Ottoman period, which had its heyday between the late fifteenth and the seventeenth centuries, has always been prominent among Islamic art objects. Iznik, a city in West Anatolia situated 90 km southeast of Istanbul, and known as Nicaea from Antiquity, was a major place of production. The fabrication of tiles increased during the second half of the 16th century. Ceramic vessels or other pieces were also produced. Until the 17th century, pottery from Iznik was traded all over the Ottomon Empire and even exported as far as Venice. At the beginning of the 17th century, a pottery workshop in Padua imitated the Turkish design. Towards the end of the 17th century, the production in the workshops at Iznik decreased and was given up entirely in the 18th century due to an unfortunate series of events: ignorance of harmful effects during production processes, fires in the pottery quarters, malaria epidemics and a change in Ottoman economy. From that time onwards, the city of Kütahya in the province of the same name covered the demand for glazed pottery, where workshops are still operating today. The Museum of Applied Arts owns a representative collection of Iznik ceramics.
At the beginning everyday ceramics with a red body were produced. Later on the ceramic body of the Iznik ware became nearly pure white, compact and fine-grained.
Iznik pottery can be regarded as reflecting the latest fashion at the Ottoman court; pottery workshops maintained very good relations with the royal workshop of the Nakkaşhane. The technique of underglaze painting made Iznik famous and rich. Different periods can be distinguished by their respective styles. Slender-stalked plants with long feathery leaves interspersed with floral palmettes (inspired by Chinese Ming decor) alternate with dense leafage as a background for exotic birds and antelopes. Patterns designed by Kara Memi, an apprentice and successor of Shah Kulus, show familiar Turkish flowers such as tulips, honeysuckles, hyacinths, roses and carnations reduced to their essential characteristics.
The oldest examples have only one colour: cobalt blue. It was used as such or diluted like China ink to produce a pale blue. In the second quarter of the sixteenth century, the colour palette was expanded by a transparent turquoise, a chrome-based black pigment (for extremely fine patterns and contours), a soft pale purple on manganese basis and a greyish green. At about the same time, experiments were made with coloured engobe. Not until the second half of the 16th century bright red was used and, a little later, emerald green was produced.
 

Based on German text by Gabriele Reisenauer

Bibliography:

Aslanapa, Oktay, "Pottery and Kilns from the Iznik Excavations," in: Forschungen zur Kunst Asiens. In Memoriam Kurt Erdmann, Istanbul Üniv. Edebiyat Fak., Türk ve Islam Sanati Küsüsü (Istanbul: 1969), 140-6.

Carswell, John, Iznik Pottery, Published for the Trustees of the British Museum by British Museum Press, (London: 1998).

Denny, Walter, Osmanische Keramik aus Iznik,  Hirmer (München: 2005)

Frotscher, Sven, Keramik und Porzellan, Dt. Taschenbuch Verl. (München: 2003).

Hein, Wilhelm, Kunst des Islam, Teppiche, Keramiken und Fayencen, Gläser und Moscheelampen, Metallarbeiten aus den Sammlungen Österreichischen Museums für angewandte Kunst, Wien. Schloss Halbturn 28.5.-26.10.1977. (Wien: 1977)

Lane, Arthur, "The Ottoman Pottery of Isnik," in: Ars Orientalis, 2 (1956), 254-81.

Pichelkastner, E./Hölzl, E., Bruckmann’s Fayence-Lexikon: Majolika, Fayence, Steingut (München: 1981).

Kunst des Islam: Teppiche, Keramiken und Fayencen, Gläser und 

Moschee-lampen, Metallarbeiten aus den Sammlungen des 

Österreichischen Museums für angewandte Kunst, Wien 1977.