Islamic Art and Calligraphy

1Why ornament?

The Prophet ﷺ said: "Allah is beautiful and He loves beauty" (Muslim). And the Quran describes Allah as the One "who made excellent everything He created" 32:7; in His creation "you see no flaw" 67:3. Islamic art is an attempt to point to this beauty and order, not through an image of God, which cannot exist, but through pattern, light and writing.

In mosques and in the mushaf, Muslims have always refrained from images of people and animals. This rests on sayings of the Prophet ﷺ that view the making of images of living beings critically (al-Bukhari, Muslim). How far this applies outside the prayer hall has been judged differently by scholars, and Persian, Ottoman and Indian book painting do depict people. For sacred spaces, however, a path of its own developed: the eye is not meant to rest on a figure but to keep moving, from pattern to order, and from order to the Creator.

Three elements shape this art almost everywhere, from Andalusia to Indonesia: geometry, plant ornament (the arabesque) and calligraphy.

2Geometry – the order of creation

Every geometric pattern begins with a circle. With compass and straightedge the craftsman divides it into six, eight, ten or twelve parts, joins the points and lets stars emerge that interlace into bands and surfaces. Such a pattern has no edge that closes it off: it could be continued endlessly in every direction. Many viewers see in it an image of the infinity of Allah and of unity in diversity: countless forms, all from a single circle.

This art joined craft and science. The mathematician Abu al-Wafa' al-Buzjani (10th century) is credited with a treatise on the geometric constructions that craftsmen need. In Persia the interlaced star patterns are called girih, "knots"; in Morocco they are laid from countless small, hand-cut pieces of tile, the zellige. Whether in wood, stucco, stone, brick or tile, the language of geometry was understood everywhere.

3The arabesque – a garden without end

The second element is plant ornament, known in the West as the "arabesque". Tendrils wind and branch, put out leaves and blossoms and return into themselves: a garden that never stops growing. Many see in it a reminder of the gardens of Paradise, which the Quran describes with their rivers 47:15. Garden design itself follows this image: the Persian garden, divided into four parts by channels of water, became a model from Iran to India.

Over time the flowers became more lifelike. On the Ottoman tiles of Iznik tulips, carnations and hyacinths bloom, and in the Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque in Abu Dhabi flowers of semi-precious stone climb through the white marble.

4Calligraphy – the art of writing

The noblest art of Islam is writing. The first revealed words of the Quran speak of reading and of the pen: "Read, and your Lord is the Most Generous, who taught by the pen, taught man what he did not know" 96:3–5. One surah opens with an oath: "Nun. By the pen and what they write" 68:1. Because the Quran is the word of Allah, writing it beautifully became a form of devotion for Muslims.

The calligrapher's tool is the qalam, a reed pen whose tip is cut at an angle. Ink was traditionally made from soot, and paper was smoothed and burnished so the pen would glide over it. In the 10th century the vizier and calligrapher Ibn Muqla created a system of proportions: the height of the alif and the size of every letter are measured in rhombic dots set by the pen. Ibn al-Bawwab refined this art in the early 11th century, and Yaqut al-Musta'simi in Baghdad shaped the "six pens" (al-aqlam as-sittah) in the 13th century: Thuluth, Naskh, Muhaqqaq, Rayhan, Tawqi' and Riqa'. To this day calligraphy is learned from a master, and at the end the student receives an ijazah, a licence that places them in a chain of teachers reaching back centuries.

The most important scripts at a glance:

Kufic

The oldest of the great scripts is named after the city of Kufa in Iraq: angular, calm, with long horizontal strokes. The early Quran manuscripts on parchment in landscape format are written in Kufic, as are the inscriptions in the Dome of the Rock. Later came foliated Kufic, with leaves on the letters, and square Kufic, set into walls and domes like a maze of bricks.

Naskh

Naskh is round, clear and easy to read: the script in which most copies of the Quran are written and printed. The mushaf that millions of people hold in their hands, the edition of the King Fahd Complex in Madinah, was written in Naskh by the Syrian calligrapher Uthman Taha. When you read the Quran with us, you meet this tradition on every page.

Thuluth

Thuluth is the majestic script for large surfaces: for headings, domes, portals and the inscriptions on the cloth of the Kaaba, the kiswah, embroidered in gold and silver thread. Its letters swing in tall arcs and interlock in dense compositions. Many calligraphers consider it the most difficult and most beautiful of all scripts.

Diwani

Diwani arose in the chancery of the Ottomans, the diwan. Its letters flow closely into one another and slope, which made the script elegant and hard to forge, ideal for the sultans' documents and decrees. In its dense form, jali diwani, the words fill surfaces like ornament.

Ruq'ah

Ruq'ah is the simple, quick script of everyday life, standardised in Ottoman times. With its short, straight strokes it remains the handwriting of many people in the Arab world: on notes, boards and shop signs.

Nasta'liq

Nasta'liq arose in Iran in the 14th and 15th centuries; tradition names Mir Ali Tabrizi as its creator. The words seem to "hang" and float from upper right to lower left. It is called the "bride of scripts". It became the script of Persian and Urdu poetry, from Hafez to Iqbal.

Maghribi

In North Africa and al-Andalus the Maghribi script developed, with round, deep curves below the line. One feature is easy to remember: the fa' carries its dot below, and the qaf a single dot above. To this day Quran teachers in Morocco and West Africa write in forms of this script.

Other forms

Calligraphers played with writing: they wrote sentences in mirror image, shaped words into birds, ships or mosques, and created the tughra, the artful monogram of the Ottoman sultans. A beautiful Ottoman tradition is the hilye, a panel describing the appearance and character of the Prophet ﷺ, whose classical form was shaped by the calligrapher Hafiz Osman in the 17th century.

5Tadhhib – the gold of the mushaf

Writing is joined by illumination, in Arabic tadhhib, "gilding". With gold leaf and deep blue from lapis lazuli, artists adorned manuscripts of the Quran:

• Double-page openings often frame Surah al-Fatihah and the beginning of Surah al-Baqarah with glowing fields of ornament.
• Surah headings sit in cartouches that give the name of the surah and the number of its verses.
• Verse markers, small golden rosettes, separate one verse from the next.
• Margin medallions show where a juz', a hizb or a prostration begins.
• Bindings of leather were tooled, gilded and given a flap to protect the book.

Famous are the great Qurans of the Mamluks in Cairo and of the Ilkhanids in Iran, and the Ottoman mushafs whose style shapes many editions today. The mushaf thus became the most precious book of an entire culture.

6Architecture – spaces for prayer

A mosque really needs nothing more than a clean floor and a direction. The Prophet ﷺ built his mosque in Madinah from mud bricks and palm trunks. Yet from these simple beginnings grew an architecture of great richness. Its most important elements:

• Mihrab: the niche in the wall that marks the direction of prayer towards the Kaaba 2:144, often the most richly decorated place in the mosque.
• Minbar: the stepped pulpit from which the Friday sermon is given.
• Minaret: the tower from which the call to prayer sounds: square in North Africa, spiral in Samarra, slender as a pencil among the Ottomans, multi-tiered among the Mamluks.
• Dome: an image of the sky arching over those who pray.
• Courtyard (sahn) with a fountain for ablution.
• Iwan: a great hall open to the courtyard, typical of Iran and Central Asia.
• Muqarnas: vaults made of countless small niches that look like honeycomb or stalactites. They dissolve the transition from the square wall to the round dome into a play of light and shadow.

Light itself is a building material too. In Mamluk mosques hung glass lamps inscribed with the Verse of Light: "Allah is the Light of the heavens and the earth. The example of His light is like a niche in which there is a lamp" 24:35. You can learn more about individual buildings in the chapter on the mosques of the world.

Tiles and mosaics

In Damascus and Jerusalem the Umayyads adorned their buildings with glass mosaics on gold ground. Later each region developed its own tile art: lustreware and tiles from Kashan in Iran, the tile mosaic of the Timurids and Safavids in which every piece is cut individually, the blue-and-white and red tiles of Iznik under the Ottomans, and the zellige of Morocco and Andalusia.

Mashrabiya and wind towers

In the hot cities of the Arab world the mashrabiya was born: an oriel or window screen of turned wooden spindles. It lets in air and softened light, shields from the sun and protects the family's privacy. In Cairo, in the old town of Jeddah, where these oriels are called rawashin, and in Baghdad it shaped entire streets. On the Gulf another answer to the heat was found: wind towers (barjeel) that channel cooler air into the houses. You can still see them today in the Al Fahidi neighbourhood of Dubai.

7Masterpieces of the world

The Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem

The Dome of the Rock on the Noble Sanctuary was built under the caliph Abd al-Malik and completed in the year 72 AH (691/692). It is considered the oldest surviving major monument of Islamic art. Beneath its dome an octagonal building surrounds the rock; its mosaics show plants, trees and jewels, but no people. Its long Kufic inscriptions speak of the oneness of Allah and of Isa, son of Maryam.

The Umayyad Mosque in Damascus

At the beginning of the 8th century the caliph al-Walid had the great mosque of Damascus built. Its mosaics show rivers, trees and palaces in a peaceful landscape without people or animals; many interpret them as an image of Paradise.

The Mezquita of Córdoba

In Córdoba Abd ar-Rahman I began a mosque in the 8th century that was extended over two centuries. Its forest of red-and-white double arches and the 10th-century mihrab with its golden mosaics are among the most famous interiors in the world.

The Alhambra in Granada

The palace city of the Nasrids was built mainly in the 13th and 14th centuries. Delicate stucco, tiled dados, pools of water and muqarnas domes, as in the Hall of the Two Sisters, make it a poem of space and light. Its walls carry verses by poets such as Ibn Zamrak, and everywhere the motto of the Nasrids is repeated: wa la ghaliba illa Allah, "There is no victor but Allah".

Isfahan

Under Shah Abbas I the vast Naqsh-e Jahan Square in Isfahan was laid out in the early 17th century. The Imam Mosque with its blue tiles and the dome of the Sheikh Lotfollah Mosque are among the high points of tile art. The Friday Mosque of Isfahan with its four iwans shows how the Persian mosque developed over centuries.

The Ottoman mosques

In the 16th century the architect Sinan gave the Ottoman mosque its classical form: a great central dome surrounded by half-domes, and slender minarets. In Istanbul he built the Süleymaniye (1550–1557), and in Edirne the Selimiye, which he himself regarded as his masterpiece. The Sultan Ahmed Mosque in Istanbul owes its nickname, the "Blue Mosque", to its Iznik tiles.

Samarkand and the Taj Mahal

In Samarkand three madrasas with tiled façades form Registan Square. And in Agra the Mughal emperor Shah Jahan began building the Taj Mahal in 1632 as a tomb for his wife Mumtaz Mahal. The Quranic verses on its portals were written by the calligrapher Amanat Khan; flowers of inlaid stone climb across the white marble, and the garden is divided into four parts.

Diversity without borders

Islamic art has joined with local building traditions everywhere: in Djenné in Mali stands the great mosque of mud, re-plastered together by the community every year, and in Xi'an in China the Great Mosque, with its curved roofs, resembles a Chinese temple garden. The faith is the same; the forms speak many languages.

8The Emirates: tradition and future

In the Emirates this tradition is not only preserved but carried forward.

The Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque

The Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque in Abu Dhabi, opened in 2007, brings together influences from many parts of the Muslim world. White marble is inlaid with flowers of semi-precious stone, and golden palm fronds crown the columns. Its calligraphy is designed in three scripts, Kufic, Naskh and Thuluth, and the ninety-nine names of Allah stand in Kufic on the qibla wall. Calligraphers from several countries took part, among them the Emirati calligrapher Mohammed Mandi Al Tamimi.

The Louvre Abu Dhabi and the "rain of light"

On Saadiyat Island the Louvre Abu Dhabi opened in 2017, designed by the architect Jean Nouvel. Above its galleries floats a shallow dome 180 metres across. It is made of several overlapping layers of stars in a geometric pattern. When the sun shines through, a moving play of light falls on the spaces below, the "rain of light", just as light falls through the fronds of the date palms in an oasis. An ancient principle of Islamic art, the screen that filters light, becomes 21st-century architecture here.

The Museum of the Future

Since 2022 the Museum of the Future has stood on Sheikh Zayed Road in Dubai, a ring-shaped building with a void at its centre. Its stainless-steel façade is entirely covered in Arabic calligraphy, and the letters themselves are the windows. The texts are words of Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum about the future; the calligraphy was designed by the Emirati artist Mattar bin Lahej. By day light falls through the writing into the interior; at night the writing glows outwards: a building that is also a book.

Sharjah – a home for Islamic art

Sharjah has devoted itself to Islamic culture in a special way. The Sharjah Museum of Islamic Civilization, opened in 2008, shows Quran manuscripts, calligraphy, ceramics, textiles and scientific instruments. In the heart of the old town a dedicated Calligraphy Museum is devoted to this art. With the Sharjah Calligraphy Biennial and the annual Sharjah Islamic Arts Festival, artists from many countries come to the emirate; you can read more about the city in the chapter on the cities of Islam.

Calligraphy today

In the Emirates and across the region, calligraphers today master the classical rules and at the same time break new ground: they write with light, steel and glass, on canvas and on building façades, and combine Thuluth and Diwani with modern painting. You meet Arabic script on banknotes, emblems and logos, in airports and hotels. The script of the Quran has stayed alive because every generation loves it anew.

9The inspiration for these pages

The design of Quran Masterclass, too, is inspired by this art. Perhaps you have already noticed:

• The dark surfaces carry a fine pattern of interlaced eight-pointed stars, like the tooled leather bindings of old mushafs.
• The gold that highlights headings and numbers recalls the tadhhib of the manuscripts.
• Small golden rosettes and margin medallions are modelled on the verse markers and hizb signs in the margin of a mushaf, and the surah headings sit in cartouches.
• Above each chapter the Arabic title draws itself in gold, line by line, as if written with a pen.
• On the home page a ring of Quranic verses turns slowly: a greeting to the Museum of the Future in Dubai.
• And while a recitation is playing, the rosette around the play button turns.

None of this is mere decoration. As in a mosque, the design is meant to invite calm and lead the eye to what matters: the word of Allah.

10Art as worship

The Prophet ﷺ said: "Allah has prescribed excellence (ihsan) in all things" (Muslim). The calligrapher who practises the same letter for years, the craftswoman who lays a thousand pieces of tile, the architect who guides light into a dome: all of them tried to do their work with ihsan, as though they saw Allah. You can read more about this idea in the chapter The Six Pillars of Faith.

The next time you enter a mosque, take a moment: follow a tendril with your eyes, look for the circle from which a star was born, and read the inscription above the mihrab. You will see that every line points to something beyond itself.