This bowl displays the charming naturalistic qualities of the 'Potter's style', attributed between 1535 and 1545 by Nurhan Atasoy and Julian Raby, whilst retaining a few motifs inherited from the earlier, more formal 'Baba Nakkas' style of decoration with its fleshy leaves and hooked foliage (see Atasoy and Raby 1989). A close comparison can be drawn with a bowl in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, attributed between 1500 and 1525, inv. no. 32.34. It has been suggested that the motif of the cyprus tree, drawn in an abstract manner on the present example, may function as a poetic metaphor following the established Ottoman trope of cypress as a beautiful woman (New York 2011, p.298, no.207).