The Islamic art during the centuries

Abstract

Perhaps, the Islamic art is the most open manifestation of a rather complex civilization, which often seeming to others from the outside as an enigmatic one. The balanced application of colors in moulds and drawing make the Islamic art cause an immediate impact in the eyes of the onlooker. The strict aesthetic of this art exceeds time and space distances as it does with the ones of the languages, cultures and beliefs. Not only does the Islamic art invite to have a closer look, but also to learn more.
In the Islamic culture, the so-called decorative arts assure the essential means to convey the artistic expressions, on the contrary with the western ones where picture and sculpture prevail.
Illustrated manuscripts, textiles and carpets, imprinted metals, flowered glasses, glistened ceramics, craved woods and stones, all of these absorb artists’ creative energies, thus becoming very developed forms of art.
Artistic works, such as: pottery, metallic items, carpets and textiles are seen as products belonging only to the middle class of the town. However, these objects reflect often the same style and use of forms and techniques like the ones of the court’s art.
Whereas the period of Islam has a well-known and determined date that begins with the exile of the Prophet Muhammad from Mecca to Medina in 622, the birth of Islamic art is very difficult to be dated. Approximately, it may date the 1st year Hijjri of the Islamic rule.
Compared to the early Islamic art, the artistic works of the early medieval time have a wider use of figurative forms and decorations. Wellbeing and material prosperity achieved by the Fatimid Egypt and Syria are reflected in the artistic abundance. This is the time of a splendid creativity, in which some former techniques reached their highest height and new ways of artistic expression were invented.
In the late Islamic period, the art of Ottoman decoration and that of the book were reflected with the repertoire of herbal and floral patterns.