Islamic Art Influence

Muslims ruled a large empire for a long period of time. The influence of the Islamic Empire is demonstrated through the similarities of the arts and architecture from the Umayyad to the Ottomans. The issue is the museum website refers to all the art as Islamic Art, which is not the case. Depending on the observer, one can interpret whether all the art as Islamic or not. For instance, an orthodox Muslim might find only the art that contains calligraphy, geometry, and vegetal designs as Islamic. On the hand, a secular Muslim might find the all the arts including figural representations as Islamic. Besides religion, the art is grouped together based on time period, geography and the dynasty that ruled. To recognize how the empire developed and

Abd-al-Malik changes the common Byzantine coins that have icons and figures on it to Arabic script from the Quran. This is one of the most important change the Umayyad brought to the Islamic Empire. In some ways it set a precedence of the importance of calligraphy in Islamic art, which continues to be used to this day. By replacing the coins that had leaders on them to Quranic verses, the Umayyad caliphate unified the Islamic Empire and emphasized the power of God and not humans. When the Abbasid Dynasty came into power, the last ruler of the Umayyad dynasty fled to Spain and became the ruler there and became the Amir of the state and ruled for a long time. The Islamic Empire there adapted to the arts influenced by the majority non-Muslims in

It was no different for the Muslims. Islamic Art has many influences from the conquered. Despite the influence and cultural exchanges between many empires, Islam maintained its unique style of art and architecture of calligraphy, vegetal work, and geometric shapes. Over the vast empire and the long period of ruling, the cultural exchanges between Islamic Empire and other empires influenced the arts and architecture that still impacts the culture of that area today. But it is also important to be mindful that not all the art is