History of Art

Berlekamp, Persis. “From Iraq to Fars: Tracking Cultural Transformations in the 1322 Qazwini `Aja’ib Manuscript.” In Handbücher der Orientalistik, 90, Arab Painting: Text and Image in Illustrated Arabic Manuscripts, ed. Anna Contadini (Leiden: Brill, 2007), pp. 73-91.

Berlekamp, Persis, Vivienne Lo, and Yidan Wang. “Administering Art, History, and Science in the Mongol Empire: Rashid al-Din and Bolad Chengxiang.” In Pearls on a String: Art in the Age of Great Islamic Empires, ed. Amy Landau, 53-85. (Baltimore and Seattle: Walters Art Museum and Washington University Press, 2015).

Resumen Tanto para la sociedad medieval como para la  moderna, el puente Zangid en Jacirat b. ʿUmar / Cizre / ʿAin Diwar ha estado siempre intimamente ligado a sus aguas.  Historicamente, los reflejos de su arco de boveda, los relieves astrologicos y la caligrafia cufica brillaron sobre ellos en una variedad de combinaciones. El conjunto del puente y sus aguas expresaban el amplio simil poetico de la tierra como espejo del cielo, el vinculo casual que la sociedad medieval pensaba que existia entre los ambitos terrestre y celestial, asi como la naturaleza altamente intangible del acceso terrenal a las esferas celestiales.  En el mundo actual, esas mismas aguas delimitan la conflictiva linea fronteriza entre los estados de Siria y Turquia. Como resultado, el acceso de los expertos al puente tambien ha sido muy restringido, convertida en una zona peligrosa por los robos y que dificulta nuestro acceso al pasado.Por todo ello, el puente ejemplariza tanto la sofisticada relacion medieval ...

Talismans drawing on the combined iconographies of lions and dragons proliferated on the walls and doors of cities and civic institutions in early thirteenth-century Iraq, Syria, and Anatolia. This article examines them in light of three different medieval theoretical models, seeking to shed light on why intelligent people in their original milieus might have expected such talismans to have protective power.

Whether for medieval or modern audiences, the Zangid bridge at Jazirat b. ʿUmar / Cizre / ʿAin Diwar has been integrally linked to its waters. Historically, reflections of its dome-like arch, astrological reliefs, and Kufic calligraphy shimmered on them in shifting combinations. The bridge and its waters thereby together expressed the widespread poetic trope of the earth as the mirror of the heavens, the causal link medieval audiences believed existed between terrestrial and celestial realms, and the highly elusive nature of earthly access to heavenly influences. In the modern world, the same waters define the troubled state border between Syria and Turkey. As a result, scholarly access to the bridge has also been highly elusive, making it particularly vulnerable to theft, and endangering our access to the past.

The forms and concepts of decoration are not solely the domain of architectural history, the history of decorative arts, or the emerging field of visual culture. They have a place in art history as well. Decoration can be central to artistic practice, to the ways in which art communicates ...