Chapter 13 Islamic Art
The religion of Islam (an Arabic word meaning “submission to God”) arose among the people of the Arabian Peninsula early in the 7th century. In little more than a century the armies of Islam had subdued the Middle East. The sweep of Islam was not due to military might alone, but also an appeal to millions of converts.
Islamic culture had a period of greatness in the middle ages. Christian scholars from the West during the 12 and 13th centuries eagerly studied Arabic translations of Aristotle and other Greek writers of antiquity. Arab scholars laid the foundations of arithmetic and algebra, and their contributions to astronomy, medicine and the natural sciences made a lasting impression on the Western world.
In the Middle East and North Africa, Islamic art largely replaced the art of Late Antiquity. Their distinctive style is seen in architecture. The most famous building in Asia, the Taj Mahal, at Agra, India, is an Islamic mausoleum. Islamic rulers were builders on a grand scale.
Architecture
The first great achievement in Islamic architecture is the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem. The city fell from Byzantine control in 638. The Caliph
Abd al – Malik (r.685-705) erected the monumental sanctuary between 687 and 692 as an architectural tribute to the triumph of Islam. The structure rises from a huge platform known as the Noble Enclosure. The sanctuary was erected on the traditional site of Adam’s burial, of Abraham’s preparation for Isaac’s sacrifice, and of the Temple of Solomon destroyed in 70 AD. It houses the rock from which the Muslims later came to believe Muhammad ascended into Heaven.
As Islam took much of its teaching from Christianity and Judaism, so its architects and artists borrowed and transformed design, construction, and ornamentation principles that were in Byzantium and the Middle East. The Dome of the Rock is a domed octagon resembling San Vitale in Ravenna in its basic design. In all likelihood Constantine the Greats Rotunda of the Holy Sepulchre, inspired the Dome of the Rock’s designers. The fourth century rotunda is similar to Santa Costanza in Rome. The Dome of the Rock is a double-shelled wooden dome measuring some 60 feet across and 75 feet high. It so dominates the elevation that octagonal base is not dominant.
The buildings exterior has been much restored. Tiling from the 16th century on has replaced the original mosaic. Yet the vivid patterning and color schemes are typical of Islamic ornamentation. It contrasts markedly with Byzantine brickwork and Greco-Roman sculpted and carved decoration. The interiors rich mosaic ornamentation has been preserved. Islamic practice does not differentiate between interior and exterior décor.
Great Mosque Kairouan, Tunisia
Off all the variations in mosque plans, the hypostyle mosque most closely reflects the mosque’s origin, Mohammad’s house in Medina. One of the finest examples of hypostyle mosques still in use today is the Great Mosque at Kairouan in Tunisa. It dates to the mid-eighth century. The area is
450’ x 260’, and It is built of stone. The walls have sturdy buttresses that are square in profile. A series of lateral entrances on the east and west lead to an arcaded forecourt that is on a north-south axis with the mosque’s minaret and two domes over the hypostyle prayer hall. The three story minaret is square in plan and believed to be a near copy of a Roman light house.
The Spiral Minaret
Minarets take a variety of forms. Perhaps the most impressive is that of the massive Great Mosque in Samarra, Iraq, the largest Mosque in the world. It was erected between 848 and 852 by the caliph al Mutawakkil (r. 847-861). Known as the Malwiya (“snail shell” in Arabic) minaret and more than 165 feet tall, it now stands alone, but originally a bridge linked it to the mosque. The brick tower is distinguished by its spiral ramp. The minaret is too tall to call Muslims to prayer and was probably intended to announce the presence of Islam in the Tigris Valley. This minaret inspired some European depictions of the tower of Babel.
Great Mosque at Cordoba Spain
The Arabs had overthrown the Christian kingdom of the Visigoths in Spain in 711. Their capital was Cordoba, which became a center of Arab culture that rivaled Bagdad and exerted major influence on the civilization of the Christian West.
The Jewel of the capital of Cordoba was the Great Mosque which begun in 784 and enlarged several times during the 9th and 10th centuries. The original design and enlargements maintained a stylistic unity that is often not achieved.
The exterior of the Great Mosque stands in some contrast to the interior, being crude and compact. Several of the decorative elements of the interior have been reproduced for the facade, but where the arches of the interior help to create openness; here they end in nothing but the flat wall.
This is not accidental: The idea of the secluded area (haram) is that non-believers and passers by shall not have access nor be able to see to the acts on the inside. Hence privacy was created together with a barrier between the believers and the infidels.
The story of the columns of the Great Mosque is quite intriguing and surprising. To the eye of the visitor, the interior of the Great Mosque appears to be the product of zealous planning. In reality it is made up entirely of columns taken from the old Visigoth cathedral and several Roman buildings. And the columns came in different shapes and sizes, and somehow the architect, Sidi ben Ayyub had to find a solution to this. He had been given little time, and dared not go to the ruler and ask for permission to make replacement columns.
Some columns were too short, some too long. The long ones were buried into the ground, while the short ones had a second row of square columns on the apex. In order to create strength and stability, horseshoe arches were built above the lower columns. In order to compensate for this "unnecessary" addition, the arches were decorated with alternate red brick and white stone. The result was; fantastic.
The same desire for decorative effects seen in the mosque inspired the design of the Dome that covers the area in front of the mihrab. The dome was one of four built in the 10th century to emphasize the axis leading to the mihrab. The Dome rests on an octagonal base of arcuated squinches and is crisscrossed by ribs that form an intricate pattern centered on two squares set at 45 degree angles to each other. The mosaics are the work of Byzantine artists. From compromises one of the most beautiful buildings in the world was created.
Sinan the Great and the Mosque of Selim II, Edirne
Sinan the Great (1491-1588) was the greatest Ottoman architect. He was born a Christian. He was trained in engineering and the art of building, and converted to Islam while serving in the Ottoman army. He was appointed chief architect for Suleyman the Magnificent (r. 1520-1566), a generous patron of art and architecture.
The capstone of Sinan’s career was the Edirne mosque of Selim II, Suleyman’s son, designed when he was 80 years old. It was here that he sought so surpass all the great achievements of the Byzantine architects of the past. A contemporary of Michelangelo, Sinan perfected the Ottoman architectural style. By this time the domed unit was universally used. Typical Ottoman buildings reflected of Sinan’s time were a creative assemblage of domical units and juxtaposed geometric spaces with great structural safety. Sinan working in architectural traditions, searched for solutions to the problems of unifying the additive elements and of creating a centralized space with harmonious proportions.
The massive dome is set off by four slender pencil shaped minarets each more than 200 feet high. Various independent structures were placed around the mosque. These included libraries, schools, hospice, baths, soup kitchens for the poor, markets and hospitals as well as a cemetery containing a mausoleum of the sultan responsible for building the mosque.
The height of the dome surpasses Hagia Sophia. The plan of the main hall is an ingenious fusion of an octagon with a dome covered square. The dome sits on an octagon formed on 8 massive piers. The octagon is pierced by four half-domed-covered corners of a square. The result is a fluid interpretation of several geometric volumes that unify the interior space. Sinan’s forms are clear and legible, like mathematical equations. Height,
Width, and masses are related to one another in a simple but effective ratio of 1;2. The building is considered the climax of Ottoman architecture and Sinan’s masterpiece.
Great Mosque of Isfahan, Iran
Mosques were often built and remolded multiple times over the centuries. The present day Great mosque In Isfahan, Iran, retains much of the plan of the 11th century renovations that took place under Sultan Malik Shah I. The mosque consists of a large courtyard bordered by a two story arcade on each side. Four iwans (a vaulted rectangular opening into the courtyard) one at the center of each side, allow entrance into the courtyard. In structures with four iwans, the quiba (toward Mecca) iwan is always the largest. Its size and its dome immediately indicate to worshippers the proper direction for prayer. This four iwans and a dome before the mihrab, used first here, soon became the standard for Iranian mosque design.
The use of tiles has a long history in the Middle East. The art of ceramic tilework reached in peak, in the Islamic world, in the 16th and 17th centuries in Iran and Turkey. Employed as a veneer over a brick core, tiles could sheath, entire buildings, domes, and minarets. The winter prayer hall of the Imam Mosque, also in Isfahan, dates to the 17th century, and is widely recognized as a masterpiece of Islamic tilework. Covering the walls, arches, and vaults of the prayer hall presented special challenges to the ceramicists. They had to create a wide variety of curved shapes with curved surfaces to sheath the complex forms of the hall. The result was a triumphant technological as well as aesthetic success of abstract ornament.
Calligraphy was also important to Islamic art because it often contained wording from the Koran. Calligraphy was also incorporated in tilework. A 14th century mihrab from the Madrasa Imami in Isfahan exemplifies the perfect aesthetic union between the calligraphers art and arabesque ornament. The pointed arch enframes the mihrab niche bears an inscription from the Koran in Kufic (a particular font or style). Another style fills the mihrabs outer rectangular frame. Geometric and abstract floral designs fill the rest of the niche and the area above the pointed arch. The artist transferred the architectural surface into a textile surface with great unity.
Luxury Arts
Muslim artists also excelled in more private luxury arts. The example is a very large carpet that is one of a pair. It comes from the funerary mosque of Shaykh Safi al-Din (1252-1334) but was made 200 years after the erection of the mosque during the reign of Shah Tahmasp (r. 1524-1576). Tahmasp elevated carpet weaving to a national industry. The name of Maqsud Kashan is woven into the carpet. He must have been the designer of the carpet who supplied the master pattern to two teams of royal weavers (one for each carpet). The carpet is almost 35’ x 18’ and consists of roughly 25 million knots, some 340 per square inch.
The design consists of a central sunburst medallion, representing the inside of a dome surrounded by sixteen pendants. Mosque lamps are suspended from two pendants on the long axis of the carpet. The background is a rich blue covered with leaves and flowers attached to delicate stems that spread over the whole field. The entire composition presents the illusion of a heavenly dome and lamps reflecting in a pool of water full of floating lotus blossoms.
The furnishings of Islamic Palaces and mosques reflected a love of sumptuous materials and rich decorative patterns. One such example is the cast brass ewer in the form of a bird signed by Sulayman and dated 796. The ewer is 15” high is basically a free standing statue that had a utilitarian purpose as the holes between the eyes and beak function as a spout. The decoration on the body bears traces of silver and copper inlay. Some of the etched lines suggest the bird’s feathers, but medallion forms and rosettes have no basis in anatomy, only decoration. These motifs are visible in Islamic designs on other things and seem to be easily adapted to a variety of forms displaying an independence from its carrier.
Though figures and animals are not dominant subjects in Islamic art, they do appear. In this brass basin from Egypt inlaid with gold and silver, we see both. This basin is signed six times by Mamluk artist Muhammad ibn al-Zayn. Used for washing hands, the basin must have been designed for a specific Mamluk patron. The central band depicts Mamluk hunters and Mongol enemies. Running animals fill the friezes above and below. Arabesques of inlaid silver fill the background of all the bands and roundels. Figures and animals also decorate the inside and underside of the basin. The basin has long been known as the Baptistere de Saint Louis, but the association with the French king Louis IX: The Saintly King is a myth for he died before the piece was made. Nonetheless the basin was brought to France long ago and used in the baptismal rites of the French Royal family newborns, as early as the 17th century.
This canteen with the episodes from the Life of Christ is another example of the prestige of Islamic art in Western Europe.