From Alhambra to Digital Projection: Designing a Digital Media Cultural Heritage Project Based on the Transformative Qualities of Islamic Calligraphy

M J Khajavi

doi:10.1088/1757-899x/364/1/012053

Abstract

This paper traces how the design of a new media cultural heritage project was inspired by the transformative qualities found in many specimens of Islamic calligraphy. As certain scholars have pointed out, Islamic art is filled with examples of letters and words that appear to transform into things other than text. Indeed, such transformative qualities can be seen across the Islamic world and on a diverse range of artefacts, including the epigraphs on the walls of the Alhambra palace and the religious texts on Ottoman Turkish scrolls written in ghubār (which literary means “dust” in Arabic) script. In this paper, the author outlines two broad types of transformative qualities that can be distinguished in many specimens of Islamic calligraphic art, namely, the metamorphosis of the form and the transformation of the function of the letters and words. The paper then demonstrates how, inspired by such transformative qualities, the designers of a cultural heritage project created a calligraphic installation for museums and galleries in which letters are transformed from text to image and vice versa. Using a projection mapping system, words are transformed into images devoid of any semantic meaning, and then revert back into readable text again. Finally, the paper investigates how the transformation of the function of calligraphy renders readability a transitory process in this artwork, and how the technique used in the creation of this artwork can be applied to cultural heritage sites as an educational and entertainment tool.

Highlights

The Alhambra, a palatial city in Granada, Spain, contains examples of some of the more visually complex ornamentation found in Islamic art
Ünlüer and Özcan rightfully argue that the “formal design solutions of past cultures can generate new innovative ideas” in new media design [12]. Their claim is appropriate here, as this digital media installation received its inspiration from qualities that have existed for centuries in Islamic calligraphy
Projection mapping was used in this digital media cultural heritage installation to activate and animate the transformative qualities that exist in many specimens of Islamic calligraphy

Summary

Introduction

The Alhambra, a palatial city in Granada, Spain, contains examples of some of the more visually complex ornamentation found in Islamic art. Visitors to the Alhambra may note that the interior walls of several of its chambers are decorated with calligraphic inscriptions. The Arabic epigraphs in the Alhambra have been the subject of numerous scholarly investigations. These include detailed analyses of the signification and meaning of both the Qur’anic and the secular poetic inscriptions (see, for example, Grabar [1] and Bush [2]). I do not intend to discuss the religious and poetic content of these epigraphs. Central to the discussion in this article are some of the calligraphic inscriptions on the walls of the Alhambra, in which words and vegetal decorations appear to blend.

Published under licence by IOP Publishing Ltd

Conclusion