We report the observation of near-IR emission from erbium in silicon-rich silica, excited using a filtered white-light source. The characteristic 4I13/2–4I15/2 intra-4f transition at 1535 nm is observed even when excitation wavelengths corresponding to the principal erbium optical absorption bands are removed using selective filtering. We ascribe this effect to an efficient transfer mechanism between silicon nanoclusters present in the silicon-rich silica films and the rare-earth ions. This is in good agreement with our previous work in this area and suggests the possibility of obtaining flashlamp-pumped erbium optoelectronic devices.