Iranian Art from the Sasanians to the Islamic Republic - (Edinburgh Studies in Islamic Art) by Sheila S Blair & Jonathan M Bloom & Sandra Williams

About the Book

13 essays examine different media, including architecture, manuscripts, portable arts and textiles, as well as the contemporary arts of painting, photography, printmaking and video, from the early Islamic period to the present.

Book Synopsis

Linda Komaroff, long-time curator of the Art of the Middle East at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), has pioneered in the study and exhibition of Islamic art to include contemporary works. Her interests have long focused on the arts of Iran. With this volume her friends and colleagues celebrate her broad scope with essays exploring many new areas. These 13 essays examine different media, including architecture, manuscripts, portable arts and textiles, as well as the contemporary arts of painting, photography, printmaking and video, from the early Islamic period to the present. In addition to traditional approaches to art-historical scholarship, such as textual analysis, connoisseurship, design, technical and material analysis, and archaeology, the contributors take on such newer themes as gift giving, the diaspora of Iranian art, political art, the relationship of the present to the past or vice versa, and the connections between Iranian art and the arts of the West. Some essays also deal with music and dance.

Review Quotes

"'his volume's rich harvest of papers faithfully mirrors the remarkably diverse range of interests from Iberia to Japan which has marked Linda Komaroff's distinguished career both as curator and as research scholar. We move from Mongol art to metalwork and music, from ceramics and carpets to book painting, gift-giving and modern Persian art: infinite riches in a little room.'--Robert Hillenbrand, University of Edinburgh

About the Author

Sheila S. Blair is the Norma Jean Calderwood University Professor of Islamic and Asian Art and the Boston College and Hamad bin Khalifa Endowed Chair of Islamic Art, Virginia Commonwealth University.

Jonathan M. Bloom is the author, co-author, editor, or co-editor of fifteen books and hundreds of articles on all aspects of Islamic art and architecture, including the art of the Fatimid dynasty, and the history of paper. He and his wife and colleague Sheila Blair edited the prize-winning 3-volume Grove Encyclopedia of Islamic Art and Architecture (2009) and organize the Hamad bin Khalifa Biennial Symposia on Islamic Art and Culture.

Sandra Williams, is Assistant Curator, Art of the Middle East, Los Angeles County Museum of Art and specializes in the arts of the Persianate world.