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Through its material remains, Perspectives on Early Islamic Art in Jerusalem analyzes several overlooked aspects of the earliest decades of Islamic presence in Jerusalem, during the seventh century CE. Focusing on the Haram al-Sharif, also known as the Temple Mount, Lawrence Nees provides the first sustained study of the Dome of the Chain, a remarkable eleven-sided building standing beside the slightly later Dome of the Rock, and the first study of the meaning of the columns and column capitals with figures of eagles in the Dome of the Rock. He also provides a new interpretation of the earliest mosque in Jerusalem, the Haram as a whole, with the sacred Rock at its center.
From the time of Herod through the Crusades, Jerusalem had officially "changed its religion" several times, with Jews, Christians, and Muslims inscribing the story of their faiths on the urban landscape. In this handsomely illustrated book, noted Islamist Oleg Grabar offers a rare account of the great role played by early Islam in defining the "look" of Jerusalem that remained largely intact until the twentieth century. From about 640 to 1100, Muslims transformed Christian Jerusalem, mainly the area now known as the Haram al-Sharif, both physically and ideologically to embody their new faith. Grabar examines this process, showing how it led to great architectural achievements, including The Dome of the Rock, still perhaps the most vivid image to impress any visitor to Jerusalem. Offering a major photographic record of The Dome's mosaics in color together with its interiors, this book shows in rich detail how Islam articulated itself architecturally, touching on historical and legendary memories and on themes of both religious harmony and Islamic triumph. Dominating Jerusalem's landscape today, The Dome of the Rock was commissioned by Abd Al-Malik in 691, and still houses the Rock from which the Prophet Mohammed is believed to have ascended into heaven. Grabar argues that its construction altered the visual equilibrium of Jerusalem by equating its eastern hill, Mt. Moriah, a key landmark in Islam, with its western ones, Golgotha and Mt. Zion, highlighted by Christian monuments. A close look at The Dome's construction and decoration leads to a new explanation of the building as a Late Antique monument of art that could be adapted to several different and at times simultaneous interpretations. Grabar also offers a unique portrait of Jerusalem in the eleventh century under the Fatimid dynasty in Cairo, when the city was at its peak as a peaceful, cosmopolitan center. Through an innovative computer modeling program, Grabar presents fascinating reconstructions of the Haram al-Sharif, taking us down streets and past buildings, of which only remnants exist today.
Early Islamic Art, 650-1100 is the first in a set of four volumes of studies by Oleg Grabar. Between them they bring together more than eighty articles, studies and essays, work spanning half a century. Each volume takes a particular section of the topic, the three subsequent volumes being entitled: Islamic Visual Culture, 1100-1800; Islamic Art and Beyond; and Jerusalem. Reflecting the many incidents of a long academic life, they illustrate one scholar's attempt at making order and sense of 1400 years of artistic growth. They deal with architecture, painting, objects, iconography, theories of art, aesthetics and ornament, and they seek to integrate our knowledge of Islamic art with Islamic culture and history as well as with the global concerns of the History of Art. In addition to the articles selected, each volume contains an introduction which describes, often in highly personal ways, the context in which Grabar's scholarship developed and the people who directed and mentored his efforts. The present volume concentrates primarily on documents provided by archaeology understood in its widest sense, and including the study of texts with reference to monuments or to the contexts of these monuments. The articles included represent major contributions to the understanding of the formative centuries of Islamic art, focusing on the Umayyad (661-750) and Fatimid (969-1171) dynasties in Greater Syria and in Egypt, and on the Mediterranean or Iranian antecedents of early Islamic art. Historical, cultural, and religious themes, including the role of court ceremonies, the growth of cities, and the importance of the Qur'an, are introduced to help explain how a new art was formed in the central lands of the Near East and how its language can be retrieved from visual or written sources.
This volume deals with the formative period of Islamic art (to c. 950), and the different approaches to studying it. Individual essays deal with architecture, ceramics, coins, textiles, and manuscripts, as well as with such broad questions as the supposed prohibition of images, and the relationships between sacred and secular art. An introductory essay sets each work in context; it is complemented by a bibliography for further reading.
This anthology honors Lawrence Nees’ expansive contributions to medieval art historical inquiry and teaching on the occasion of his retirement from the University of Delaware. These essays present a cross-section of recent research by students, colleagues, and friends; the breadth of subjects explored demonstrates the pertinence of Nees’ distinctive approach and methodology centering human agency and creativity. The contributions follow three main threads: Establishing Identity, Patronage and Politics, and Beyond the Canon. Some authors draw upon Nees’ systematic analysis of iconographic idiosyncrasies and ornamental schemes, whether adorning manuscripts or monumental edifices, which elucidates their unique visual and material characteristics. Others apply a Neesian engagement with the complex dynamics of cultural exchange, visual manifestations of political ambitions and ideologies, and selective mining of the classical past. Ultimately, this collection aims to illustrate the impact of Nees’ transformative scholarship, and to celebrate his legacy in the field of medieval art history.
Located on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, the Dome of the Rock was constructed at the end of the seventh century by order of caliph 'Abd al-Malik. This seminal structure has been much studied but no definitive interpretation yet exists of the meanings conveyed by the Dome at the time of its completion. The recovery of meaning is complicated by the paucity of primary written sources relating to the construction phases of the building and the motivations of its patron. This book concentrates on the most important surviving primary text, the long mosaic inscription running around the interior. Comprising a dedication and date (72/691-92) and material of a religious nature, the mosaic inscription provides vital evidence for the reconstruction of the meanings and functions of the Dome of the Rock. The detailed study of the mosaics helps to place them in the context of Late Antique monumental writing, particularly in Greek. The book makes use of contemporary Islamic coins, graffiti, and other inscribed objects in order to examine the Dome of the Rock in the relation to the ideological concerns of the Umayyad elite during and after the second Civil War.
Islam in Historical Perspective provides readers with an introduction to Islam, Islamic history and societies with carefully selected historical and scriptural evidence that enables them to form a comprehensive and balanced vision of Islam’s rise and evolution across the centuries and up to the present day. Combining historical and chronological approaches, the book examines intellectual dialogues and socio-political struggles within the extraordinary rich Islamic tradition. Treating Islam as a social and political force, the book also addresses Muslim devotional practices, artistic creativity and the structures of everyday existence. Islam in Historical Perspective is designed to help readers to develop personal empathy for the subject by relating it to their own experiences and burning issues of today. It contains a wealth of historical anecdotes and quotations from original sources that are intended to emphasize its principal points in a memorable way. This new edition features a thoroughly revised and updated text, new illustrations, expanded study questions and chapter summaries.
This richly illustrated study shows how modern systems of textual presentation grew from techniques developed in the medieval period.
Structured as five microhistories c. 632-705, this book offers a counternarrative for the formation of Islamic architecture and the Islamic state. It adopts a novel periodization informed by moments of historical violence and anxiety around caliphal identities in flux, animating histories of the minbar, throne, and maqsura as a principal nexus for navigating this anxiety. It expands outward to re-assess the mosque and palace with a focus on the Qubbat al-Khadraʾ and the Dar al-Imara in Kufa. It culminates in a reading of the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem as a site where eschatological anxieties and political survival converge.
Deaf Walls Speak presents an insider’s view of artmaking in Guantánamo, the world’s most notorious prison, as self-expression and protest, and to stage a fundamental human rights claim that has been denied by law and politics: the right to be recognized as human. The book juxtaposes detainee artist Moath al-Alwi’s testimony and artwork with essays that situate his work within legal, political, aesthetic, and material contexts to demonstrate that artwork at Guantánamo constitutes important forms of material witnessing to human rights abuses perpetrated and denied by the U.S. government.