The ‘oriental’ style of Bezalel products was a European invention, not indigenous

Evidence

In order to acquire a firsthand knowledge of these crafts, the teachers of the departments (all of European origin) were sent to Middle Eastern cities to study the techniques. But their design often incorporated different stylistic influences from East and West including “oriental” ornamentation that was already being used by nineteenth-century European craftsmen. — Ivan Davidson Kalmar, Derek Penslar, Orientalism and the Jews, 604

Categorization

• XREF: Parallels the ‘Grafting & Growth’ article’s theme of authenticity as constructed performance, and the broader literature on invented tradition (Hobsbawm & Ranger).
• ADDENDUM: Supports the ‘Complaints About Immodesty Go Way Back’ theme of Westerners projecting invented ‘oriental’ aesthetics back onto the East while claiming to document them.
• DEEPTHINKING: The recursive loop — Europeans studying techniques in the Middle East, then re-exporting already-Europeanized ‘oriental’ ornamentation as authentic — is a tight little sample of how colonial authenticity is manufactured in a feedback cycle.