Reflections through British Muslim Artists

This is my most recent article on Islam Online. Click here to read about the contributions made by British Muslim Artists to Islamic Art.


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The assumption made when referring to Islamic art is the uniqueness of the term. However, it is important to understand what the word “Islamic” means when modifying the noun art. In order to define an aesthetic tradition it is imperative to initially explain the internal creative purpose rather than the iconographic or external functional characteristics.

The Arabic word “Islam” itself means submission to Allah. Islam teaches us that this life is a life of worship. Therefore, we can hypothesize that Islamic art was originally developed as a means of encouraging and adhering to the modes of worship permitted by Islam’s doctrines.

Islamic art in contrast to most other art forms is not the art of a nation, of a geographical area, or of a religion. Instead it is a continuous process of growth and change, interchange, and amalgamation on a multitude of people and cultural traditions. This in turn may be considered problematic when determining its characteristics.

My investigation with an attempt to define Islamic art lies with remarks on the wider implications of concerns with its iconography. The word iconography is a combination of the Greek words eikon (image) and graphain (writing). Together, this amounts to writing in images in order to indicate a specific meaning. The study of iconography in art history is consequently the study of existing images and symbols in the art of a given culture and its interpretation.

If we study the images and symbols that were created by artists working within the culture of Islam we find ourselves confronted by a series of difficulties peculiar to the singular phenomenon of Islamic art. I intend to overcome these difficulties by examining the main principles of Islamic art including aniconism, geometry, arabesque, and calligraphy. I will conclude by touching on contributions made by contemporary British Islamic artists in this modern era providing insights that may be useful to shaping the future of Islamic art.

Due to the recent migration of people from Islamic countries to Britain, we have witnessed a resurgence of interest in Islamic art and the emergence of artists in Britain producing artwork catering to a Muslim audience. Islamic art is evolving further, taking influence from ‘global’ modern and contemporary styles to appeal to an international audience and in order to compete with the mainstream European art market. I intend to look at the basic principles of Islamic art and how this has impacted the work of British Muslim artists.

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