Islamic Art

An alternate approach to Islamic art emphasizing literary over historical contexts and reception over production in visual arts and music.

This is the first book in the English language to deal with the spiritual significance of Islamic art including not only the plastic arts, but also literature and music. Rather than only dealing with the history of the various arts of Islam or their description, the author relates the form, content, symbolic language, meaning, and presence of these arts to the very sources of the Islamic revelation. Relying upon his extensive knowledge of the Islamic religion in both its exoteric and esoteric dimensions as well as the various Islamic sciences, the author relates Islamic art to the inner dimensions of the Islamic revelation and the spirituality which has issued from it. He brings out the spiritual significance of the Islamic arts ranging from architecture to music as seen, heard, and experienced by one living within the universe of the Islamic tradition. In this work the reader is made to understand the meaning of Islamic art for those living within the civilization which created it.

Islamic Art is a product of certain forceful factors that created a cultural milieu which was centred on the religious ethos and intellectual affinities inspired by Islam and its followers. No art can grow in isolation and nor did Islamic art. From its early manifestations to this date, it has taken from other cultural traditions and has also given to different social structures and visual languages of the world. This book looks at the artistic output of the Islamic civilization through the centuries, from the time of its inception to its interpretations in the contemporary world. The author has brought the inclusive as well as the exclusive qualities of this great tradition of the world with the empathy and seriousness that this unique art demand.

This richly illustrated book provides an unsurpassed overview of Islamic art and architecture from the seventh to the thirteenth centuries, a time of the formation of a new artistic culture and its first, medieval, flowering in the vast area from the Atlantic to India. Inspired by Ettinghausen and Grabar’s original text, this book has been completely rewritten and updated to take into account recent information and methodological advances. The volume focuses special attention on the development of numerous regional centers of art in Spain, North Africa, Egypt, Syria, Anatolia, Iraq, and Yemen, as well as the western and northeastern provinces of Iran. It traces the cultural and artistic evolution of such centers in the seminal early Islamic period and examines the wealth of different ways of creating a beautiful environment. The book approaches the arts with new classifications of architecture and architectural decoration, the art of the object, and the art of the book. With many new illustrations, often in color, this volume broadens the picture of Islamic artistic production and discusses objects in a wide range of media, including textiles, ceramics, metal, and wood. The book incorporates extensive accounts of the cultural contexts of the arts and defines the originality of each period. A final chapter explores the impact of Islamic art on the creativity of non-Muslims within the Islamic realm and in areas surrounding the Muslim world.

The historical development of Islamic art and the variations of different geographical regions are surveyed

What is 'art' in the sense of the Islamic tradition? Mohammed Hamdouni Alami argues that Islamic art has historically been excluded from Western notions of art; that the Western aesthetic tradition's preoccupation with the human body, and the ban on the representation of the human body in Islam, has meant that Islamic and Western art have been perceived as inherently at odds. However, the move away from this 'anthropomorphic aesthetic' in Western art movements, such as modern abstract and constructivist painting, have presented the opportunity for new ways of viewing and evaluating Islamic art and architecture. This book questions the very idea of art predicated on the anthropocentric bias of classical art, and the corollary 'exclusion' of Islamic art from the status of art. It addresses a central question in post-classical aesthetic theory, in as much as the advent of modern abstract and constructivist painting have shown that art can be other than the representation of the human body; that art is not neutral aesthetic contemplation but it is fraught with power and violence; and that the presupposition of classical art was not a universal truth but the assumption of a specific cultural and historical set of practices and vocabularies. Based on close readings of classical Islamic literature, philosophy, poetry, medicine and theology, along with contemporary Western art theory, the author uncovers a specific Islamic theoretical vision of art and architecture based on poetic practice, politics, cosmology and desire. In particular it traces the effects of decoration and architectural planning on the human soul as well as the centrality of the gaze in this poetic view - in Arabic 'nazar'- while examining its surprising similarity to modern theories of the gaze. Through this double gesture, moving critically between two traditions, the author brings Islamic thought and aesthetics back into the realm of visibility, addressing the lack of recognition in comparison with other historical periods and traditions. This is an important step toward a critical analysis of the contemporary debate around the revival of Islamic architectural identity - a debate intricately embedded within opposing Islamic political and social projects throughout the world.

The Book in the Islamic World brings together serious studies on the book as an intellectual entity and as a vehicle of cultural development. Written by a group of distinguished scholars, it examines and reflects upon this unique tool of communication not as a physical artifact but as a manifestation of the aspirations, values, and wisdom of Arabs and Muslims in general. The Islamic system of book production differed from that of the West. This volume shows the peculiarities of book making and the intellectual principles that governed a book's inner structure, mysteries, and impact on culture. Investigated and explained are the issues involved in printing; the compilation of the Koran, the most important book in Islam; attitudes toward books; the oral versus the written tradition; metaphors of the book in literature; biographical dictionaries, an important genre of Islamic books; the grammatical tradition; women's contribution to calligraphy; scientific manuscripts; the transition from scribal to print culture; publishing in the modern Arab World; and the new electronic media, a non-book vehicle of communication, and its impact on education.

This fascinating new series will present 12 Exhibition Trails in 11 countries, which follow the chronology of the spread of Islamic art in that area. The Museum With No Frontiers programme is based on the novel idea of organising exhibitions without transporting the works of art, instead allowing the visitor to discover the artefacts, architecture and museums in their original environment and within their historical and cultural context. This concept makes it possible for the Islamic art academic or enthusiast to experience art as a living illustration of social history. Each Exhibition Trail is divided into a number of itineraries that provide detailed information on the history and significance of each structure or work and offer practical information on guided tours, transportation and cultural activities. The beautifully illustrated descriptions of the archaeological sites, artworks and architecture are written by experts in the field who live in the specified area itself. Visit the virtual gallery www.mwnf.org for further information. The exhibition is devoted to significant monuments from the reign of the Umayyad caliphs (660-750 AD) in an area that stretched from Amman to Mo