ART

The first Islamic art exchange between the Soviet Union and American museums was announced Friday by officials of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and the Smithsonian Institution. A result of the 1985 Geneva summit meeting, the exchange will involve the two American institutions and the Hermitage Museum in Leningrad, LACMA director Earl A. Powell III said. The show, featuring more than 180 paintings and other objects, has been drawn from public and private collections in the United States, Europe, the Near East and the Soviet Union. The objects to be lent by the Hermitage include a pair of gold 14th-Century bowls with dragon handles never before seen in the West and two powerfully cast 15th-Century bronze oil lamps. All of the items were commissioned by Timur, or Tamerlane, the Islamic conqueror of much of Asia.