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Referring to characteristic traditions across a wide range of lands, periods, and genres, Islamic art is a concept used first by Western art historians in the late 19th century. [2] Public Islamic art is traditionally non-representational, except for the widespread use of plant forms, usually in varieties of the spiralling arabesque.
An exhibition at the Emirates Palace in Abu Dhabi in 2008 was, at the time, the largest exhibition of Islamic art ever held. [8] The Wall Street Journal has described it as the greatest collection of Islamic Art in existence. [4] According to Edward Gibbs, Chairman of Middle East and India at Sotheby's, it is the best such collection in private ...
[8] [3] This supports the idea that the Blue Quran was created in the Western Islamic world. Additionally, the Blue Quran shares many characteristics, including its deep blue color, with the Bible of Cava, a manuscript created in 812 CE in Umayyad Spain. [11]
Islamic art was widely imported and admired by European elites during the Middle Ages. [5] There was an early formative stage from 600-900 and the development of regional styles from 900 onwards. Early Islamic art used mosaic artists and sculptors trained in the Byzantine and Coptic traditions. [6]
Traditionally speaking in the Islamic empire, Arabic calligraphy was the common form of recording texts. Calligraphy is the practice or art of decorative handwriting. [3] The demand for calligraphy in the early stages of the Islamic empire (circa 7–8th century CE) can be attributed to a need to produce Qur'an manuscripts.
Islamic art began with artists and craftsmen mostly trained in Byzantine styles, and though figurative content was greatly reduced, Byzantine decorative styles remained a great influence on Islamic art, and Byzantine artists continued to be imported for important works for some time, especially for mosaics.
For a long time, Islamic art from outside the Persianate world was considered aniconic in academic research. Known pictures including human figures from the mileu of Muslim courts have been described as an "aberration" by the early 20th-century writer Sir Thomas Arnold (d. 1930).
Islamic Art: Mirror of the Invisible World shows audiences nine countries (Egypt, Israel, Syria, Tunisia, Turkey, Iran, Spain, [8] Mali and India) and over 1,400 years of history. It presents the stories behind many well-known works of Islamic Art and Architecture.