Writing as art

This lesson asks you to be aware of the meaning of signs and symbols in works of art, and to identify and describe visual art forms you see in the community. The museum offers Islamic calligraphy: the names of its scripts and one study of inscriptions on the walls of Fatimid Cairo. Other signs and symbols, and what you see in your own community, are for your class to bring. ¹

The expectations ask about the meaning of signs and symbols and about the art forms we see around us. When you see writing on a wall, ask: how much space does it take, where is it placed, and how does the shape of the letters change from one place to another?

Look at the front of the Aqmar Mosque in Cairo. Bernard O'Kane studied the writing on it. He says a foundation inscription with the names of the caliph and his vizier al-Ma'mun appears twice on the front. The upper copy is floriated. The lower copy is plain, with a scroll of leaves behind the letters. The caliph's name is placed exactly in the middle, above the doorway ². Floriated Kufic means that the ends and uprights of the letters are decorated with leaves, stems and blossoms ³.

The caliph's name is placed in the middle, above the doorway. What reason can you give for putting the names of a foundation inscription where everyone who comes in can see them?

• Monumental calligraphy in Fatimid Egypt: the writing on the walls of Fatimid Cairo, followed in order.
• Islamic calligraphy: how Arabic writing became an art, as the Encyclopaedia of Islam tells it.
• The Aqmar Mosque: the building whose front carries the inscription.

Read about Islamic calligraphy and then about monumental calligraphy in Fatimid Egypt. Write one short sentence in two different scripts, and say what changed for the reader.