Jameel Gallery of Islamic Art
I have long been fascinated by Islamic art and architecture and seen some wonderful work in southern Spain and northern Africa (Morocco and Eygpt). Soon I will be visiting Uzbekistan to see more magnificent examples of this style.
This week I went to see for the first time the newly-opened Jameel Gallery of Islamic Art at London’s Victoria & Albert Museum. It has taken three years of renovation and redesign but the result is a triumph: wonderful displays of some 400 objects included beautiful tiles and craftwork
The centre piece of the gallery is the Ardabil carpet. This carpet was commissioned by the Shah Tahmasp and created in 1540 . This is 36 feet long and 16 feet wide and was last seen laid out on a floor in 1892. It involves 26M hand-tied knots, some 300 per square inch. On the hour and half hour, the carpet is illuminated for 10 minutes, while the rest of the time there is no lighting to preserve it.
An important part of the gallery is devoted to Persian art – a reminder that this part of the world was the centre of cultural creativity and not the rogue Iranianstate that it is characterised today. Also one can see evidence of the fertile interchange between Muslim and Christian cultures, something which is arguably much less today.