Exploring Islamic Illumination Art: A Beautiful Guide to Tezhip

An absolutely beautiful book....worth every penny

There are very few books on the market (at least in English and in the US/UK) that actually are about the Islamic Illuminations Arts. Many are available on the use of Illumination in Medeival works and Churches in the Western traditions but the techniques and applications between those and the Islamic Arts is very different. Both generally utilize the use of shell gold and both have been used to create beautiful decoration in religious manuscripts but the styles, techniques, designs are quite unique to each.

Some people who apparently have read this book seem to think it's about calligraphy. The art of Tezhip is not calligraphy it is the decorative art in floral and geometric patterns that can surround calligraphy and other works and which is generally done with the application of shell gold (powdered gold suspended in in a medium then painted on a surface and rubbed to shine) to parts of the design.

This book provides a lot of really wonderful background information and history of the art form. I've never found another book in English that goes this far in-depth in fact usually Tezhip gets at best a cursory mention in general art overviews on the subject of illumination and/or Islamic arts. Though I've sought out most of the information from various sources over the years this is the first source I've found that compiles all of the information like this in one place.

The books pages are a nice thick paper and the images inside are beautiful. There are numerous examples of the things the author is describing and discussing. The only complaint I have is that this book doesn't have more of a pratice and methodology section. It shows you some individual parts then shows you them in a completed work but doesn't layout very well how to get from step A to step B. This is far more than most books will give you but I'd absolutely love to see perhaps another book by the author that are more practice books that do detail out the steps. Those kinds of books do exist but are generally in Turkish or in Persian/Farsi and are not easy to find in the US and only available through on-line orders in which you can't really look through them to see if they really are what you want. You can end up throwing a lot of money away on books that don't cover what you were hoping for.

With a little extra searching you can find information on how to get those in-between steps in which case this book's breakdown of the individual components can be helpful in building your pieces. It would also be useful as a reminder for people who have a basic understanding of the composition basics and can then use the breakdowns as reference reminders.

If you are just beggining your journey into the world of Tezhip this won't take you from beginner to intermediate. This will maybe take you from beginner to knowledgeable beginner with a strong understanding of history and context. Either way you'll want this book for reference later and if nothing else the beautiful imagery can be quite inspiring in your own works.

Beautiful pictures, yes, but even better are the step-by-step layers in order to recreate the motifs. Motifs organized by period theme. Examples given of multi-media objects exhibiting illumination, not just on paper.

This was a heck of a hard book to get but I finally nabbed it. I do illumination which is sometimes in the Arabic style and it seems this book has lots of tips for someone like me. Rare to find this type of thong in English.

I really really like this book for the examples it shows, and the tiny bit of technique. I would give it a 5 if there were not so many places where you are looking at the small design elements that define a particular style and then turn the page to find completed layouts and illuminations. It's like that cartoon. page 80-81- "then a miracle occurs" -page 82-83. I'd really like a couple pages of how to lay out the geometric framework for each style in between. I am assuming it is a combo of circles and squares, as shown for a couple of the designs in the back of the book, but have not hit upon the right combos yet. [...]

This book was a gift for a granddaughter who is majoring in Islamic Art
in graduate school. She was very excited to read it and continues to
enjoy it.