A study on Islamic Art

The study of Aesthetics and Arts from a point of view of the Islamic world Comparative Aesthetics Guide: Shilpa Das Asmina Shaikh Semester 6 | Graphic Design National Institute of Design

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Introduction Aesthetics can be defined as a branch of philosophy that deals with the analysis of the nature of art and our experience of art and of the natural environment. It is a set of principles that deal with the appreciation of beauty and especially in art.

Aesthetics can be applied to a singular concrete piece of art and also to the works of art that belong to a certain era or a particular culture. On a more deeper level, aesthetics can also help us derive the thought process and the circumstances under which artists from a certain period or culture created pieces of art and probably also lead us to the answer to why they created them in a certain way.

Aesthetics is commonly looked at as a science to study and define the method of creation of artworks or to analyze them. But aesthetics can also be applied to the studies of cultures; unfortunately there are no doctrines or principles that can be directly applied to the study of arts of a cultural order. It is necessary to mention here that in this case aesthetics plays an important role in studying the ‘artistic thought’ rather than the artwork itself. For a long time it was considered that ‘art’ remained absent in the Islamic world as there is very little documentation of this branch of thought. But the founding book of the culture that was born with Islam remains mostly unexamined for any evidences of art or aesthetics. An apparent reason for the Koran to remain unexamined for evidences of art or artistic thoughts perhaps is because it has always been associated to the religion and any other connotations of a nonreligious impaction is considered against the religion.

The field of aesthetics deals with two distinct fields: 1. The philosophical activity involved in appreciating an object of beauty with both practical and theoretical knowledge of artistic creation.

2. The study of the texts to define the concepts of beauty and art and hence building the doctrine of artistic creation.

This also involves observation of art forms as meaningful things and experiences.

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The study of Islamic art falls into the second field of aesthetics and hence defines my approach in this paper.

I would also like to mention briefly about one of the philosophies of Islam. Islam believes that reality is transient. According to this belief nothing is permanent and everything that is real is constantly changing. Hence, any attempts to capture the reality are futile. And hence since art is merely a reflection of what surrounds us, it is a futile attempt to capture reality and make it permanent.

This sort of a belief may be a primary reason to deny art and make it an issue which is not openly discussed.

One may also infer that due to a philosophy, which led to the belief that art is futile, there have been no evidences of any art created by theology. This may yet again imply that Muslim faith devalued art.

Another argument that would hold significance here is about the term ‘Islamic’ art. The term ‘Islamic’ has a very high religious significance. Such kind of an association to art, which is essentially part of a culture, may cause complications and as a result demean art. Islamic art is all embracing. It is not a religious art and yet it has its roots in the religion. Islamic art was developed to propagate the religion and there it moved to different parts of the world and was adapted to various cultures to form some of the finest traditions in art and create some of the masterpieces of those traditions and culture.

In Islamic culture obtaining mastery over the discipline of writing, beautifying the word of God- the Koran, in buildings both religious and secular, in pottery, metalwork, glass and textiles was important and almost essential. Figurative miniature paintings, which although were not encouraged by the religion were very much a part of the Islamic culture and have been some of the greatest works of art ever created.

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How Islamic art developed?

To understand how Islamic art was born and spread to a vast stretch of the world one must briefly understand how Islam was born and under what kind of circumstances.

Islam was born in the country Arabia, when Prophet Muhammad proclaimed the religion of Islam (“I submit to the will of Allah”) as he was discontent with the polytheistic religious situation of the region. Islam attacked the people’s adherence to idol worship, their craving for wealth and luxury at the expense of the poor.

Islam was born in a region with no pictorial traditions.

It is not difficult to infer that that in a region, which was abundant with traditions of idolatry, Islam prohibited any form of figurative representations or sculptures. It was not until the unification of Arabia under Islam that enabled Islamic art to prosper.

Islamic art was greatly influenced by the pre-Islamic traditions of the various regions to which it spread. From the Arab art of the desert to the vibrant art of the Steppes of Central Asia, from the native Persian and Egyptian traditions to the Byzantium and the vegetative native art of India, all together contributed to the richness of Islamic art. It borrowed elements from the native arts of many cultures to amalgamate them in a unique manner and yet be Islamic in its flavor. It has been known for its unique ability to adapt and mix with the local traditions of the places wherever it spread.

Initially Islamic art was known to be created only to propagate and beautify the word of the Divine but gradually it also developed in various forms to combine with imageries of floral patterns, stylized animal and bird forms and in rare cases highly stylized human forms to beautify the word of God. It developed to such an extent that the highly stylized text would not be readable but merge with the imagery in a way to create mesmerising pieces of art.

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Theological arguments about art Even though some of the greatest works of miniature paintings were created in the Islamic world, Islam has never sanctioned painting. There was no painting in public in the Islamic world, because it was a private affair both in execution and appreciation.

The arguments about pictorial representations of animal and humans have lasted centuries. Figurative art was considered an encroachment of the right of the Divine. But what is exactly allowed under Islam is and has never been clear. There are many theories and they all conflict each other. Some say a picture is allowed as long as it doesn’t portray Allah or the Prophet. Sculpture on the other hand is permitted only if it portrays a stylized animal. There always have been arguments about whether the Prophet permitted paintings.

All of these arguments arose because of two prime reasons. The reasons being, firstly, there was no religious necessity for representational arts and their place was filled with calligraphic works to write the Koran and secondly, the birthplace of Islam had no history of pictorial traditions.

Painting did not receive any public patronage and this brewed religious narrow mindedness and prejudice towards painting in the minds of the commoners. This affected the artist’s subject matter and he became confined to illustrating manuscripts and to miniature painting. This lack of official patronage did not affect the Arab world but it affected the artistic spirits of the conquered countries that had converted to Islam. Eventually the conquered countries, which had a history in artistic traditions, found their ways to continue them and created some incredible schools of painting.

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The picture, painting and Islam Initially, painting was confined to manuscript illustration The first of the paintings were made for scholars to illustrate works on subjects of science, medicine, geography, botany, etc. The tradition of manuscript illustration eventually grew and the rulers gradually began to commission artists to document and illustrate lives of their kingdoms. Subjects of romance and local myths and stories were rarely illustrated.

Baghdad in the 13th century produced some finest illustrated manuscripts. They mostly documented contemporary life. The manuscripts were written in Arabic and were full of lively realistic figures. Egypt too produced paintings with both animal and human forms but they appear somewhat stiff and stylized. The first true Islamic tradition was born with the Mongol invasion of Iran, which caused a revival in Persian art. Persian art was influenced by Chinese art and techniques. The character of Persian art was developed under TImur. Under him Persian art flourished. It was during this period that Persian art constructed the ‘high horizon’ format, which lasted for centuries. During this period it also focused on naturalism, hence rocks, flowers, trees and the sky were prime elements of the paintings. The artist paid a lot of attention to decorative details. Most importantly Persian paintings did not lie. Even though the artist had complete freedom and control over what to depict he did not portray what he saw, but what he knew to exist. Hence, Persian art lacks illusion.

The other remarkable school of painting in Islamic art was the Turkish school of art. Although influenced by Persian art, Turkish art was quite different. Differences in culture were the obvious differences reflected in the art; but apart from that Turkish paintings are accounts of historical and sacred events as opposed to Persian art, which is dealt with romantic interpretations, poetry and myth.

Depictions of crowd scenes were common in Turkish art.

Islamic art also spread to India. This gave birth to the Mughal miniature. It first came to India with Timur.

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The Persian influence along with the indigenous styles of the Indian subcontinent created some masterpieces of miniature paintings. Mughal miniature is unique; it is freer and more realistic. The Mughal painter has a unique sense of perspective and they are even known to make numerous attempts at foreshortening. The commonly painted subjects were scenes from actual life, historical incidents, portraits, etc.

As Islam spread to various parts of the world along with it spread the Islamic culture and art. Different cultures adopted elements from Islamic culture and art to create unique artistic cultures. The term ‘Islamic’ eventually remained only to refer to the origin and culture that prospered with the birth of Islam in a certain region of the world. Often the term Islamic’ is known to cause controversies about art because it is mistaken for its religious significance rather than its cultural connotation.

Throughout this article, I too have chosen to use the term ‘Islamic’ because in my opinion the growth of the culture is closely linked to the growth of the religion even though they are essentially different. Hence, the term Islamic is appropriate to refer to both the culture and religion and one must be clear about what exactly is being referred to.

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Development of the art of calligraphy The Arabic script is the common link to the development of Islamic art through different parts of the world. The use of Arabic is an essential part of Islam. Arabic was a language that aided inter-communication and was a common platform for different countries with various cultural backgrounds to unite under Islam. The common religious language helped keep nationalism apart and reduced the risk of break up of the Islamic world.

The Koran was originally written in Arabic and is still written in Arabic. It is the focal point of Islam. Muslims believe that the Koran is the last of the Holy books and that it was revealed to the last Prophet, only after the art of writing had developed sufficiently. Before this knowledge was passed on from generation to generation by word of mouth. Hence, Arabic developed as a sophisticated and poetic language.

After the arrival of Islam, recording every detail of the Koran became utmost important. Hence, the Arabic language was developed extensively and the art of writing, which had been given little importance, was suddenly called upon to record the word of Allah. The Arabic script had developed to a high level of art within just a hundred years of Prophet Muhammad’s death. This art of writing in Arabic came to be known as calligraphy.

The word of the Divine, the Koran was the ultimate work of writing and hence the finest calligraphy was used to record it. Together the word of God and the art of writing produced some of the greatest works of calligraphy. This kind of artistic energy defined a large section of Islamic art and spread rapidly to the Islamic world.

The Arabs who had never expressed themselves through pictorial representations now began to express their artistic genius through calligraphy. Calligraphy hence without doubt became the greatest artistic achievement of Islamic culture. The copying of the Koran was considered of great spiritual importance both for the calligrapher as well as his patron. Arab calligraphers devoted themselves to make several copies of the sacred book. Due to the simple and linear structure of the Arabic script, it has the maximum styles of writing.

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Two basic styles of writing were developed namely ‘Kufic’ which was the formal script meant for official and formal documents and secondly the cursive scripts. The Koran was written in the Kufic script, which is bold, angular and majestic. It is also suited for monumental use and on architecture and is also used on stone for inscriptions.

The Kufic script is easy to recognize. There are a number of variations of the Kufic, some extremely elaborate and decorative. Foliated and floriated Kufic, plaited Kufic, bent Kufic are some variations. The plaited Kufic was extensively used in architectural decoration as well as for textiles.

Some of these variations were so complex that they are almost illegible. But these inscriptions were meant purely to be symbolic of the divinity. Some of the finest examples are not found in books but on pottery, particularly the white stoneware of the Iranian Samaind dynasty. In this particular article I have not written in depth about other mediums such as pottery and textiles, which are also great contributions of Islamic art and contribute greatly also to gain an insight into the Islamic aesthetic philosophy.

Another unusual development occurred in Iran, where the Kufic merged with geometric order. In this case, the inscription was organized on a square grid resulting in interlacing patterns capable of intricate repetition. These interlacing patterns and the ability of the Kufic to produce patterns formed an important feature of Islamic art.

The Turks used Naski, another form of calligraphy used for religious and historical works. Some of the finest calligraphic works were executed during this time for the Imperial library. One of the most famous work of the Turkish calligraphy was the Hilyah, a formal calligraphic picture of the Prophet. The Turks also developed the calligraphic monogram or heraldic symbol, the Tughra.

This seems to have been the first mention of calligrams.

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Other works in Iran and in Turkey were calligraphic pictures of animals and birds often created from a single phrase or word. This form of calligraphy developed into an art form called the calligram. It is a way of shaping letters of a word or saying so that when seen together they form an outline related to what is indicated by the word or saying. This could be simple forms such as the word for birds in the shape of a bird or even more complex forms.

This art form seems to make an attempt to compensate for the missing visuals in Islamic art. Throughout the development of the art of calligraphy, the art of book illumination developed alongside. Illumination is looked at as a bridge between calligraphy and painting.

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Conclusion Having looked at Islamic art from its birth to how it developed and spread to various parts of the world, one can clearly see that the ‘visual’ in Islamic art has always been controversial and has led to various assumptions including some according to which pictures and images are prohibited in Islamic art.

This sort of a controversy about images led to the development of the art of writing and calligraphy. The art of calligraphy developed to such an extent that it defined Islamic art. It was developed extensively as an outlet for the artistic genius of the Arab world. The art of calligraphy was created and refined to record the word of the divine and hence was of utmost value to the Islamic world; therefore the Arabs and other converted countries invested most to refine the art that was meant to record and propagate one of the finest works of writing ever created which was also the identity of Islamic culture.

Islamic art was also one of the biggest platforms for fusion. As it spread to different parts of the world, it fused with native cultures of the countries it spread to, to create unique cultures in art and otherwise. Every culture adopted elements from Islamic art and culture and was influenced to an extent that it created some pieces of art under some of the finest schools of painting. Islamic art is known to be very adaptive and imbibing because the place where it originated lacked a pictorial tradition. Hence, wherever it spread, it fused with pre existing artistic traditions and evolved to create various artistic traditions.

Comparative Aesthetics

Bibliography Web References: www.wikipedia.com http://iis.ac.uk/ Google Books Book references: Islamic Art and Beyond

- Chapter 13: The Aesthetics of Islamic Art Beauty and Islam

- Introduction Treasures of Islam

-Philip Bamborough

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