Patterns in Islamic Art: Recommended Books

Surface patterns on works of art created in the Islamic world have been prized for centuries for their beauty, refinement, harmony, intricacy, and complexity.

Each one of these recommended books focuses on Islamic geometric patterns, exploring their structure and meaning, and providing an introduction to Islamic art while learning about the variety of geometric patterns employed by artists to embellish a wide range of works of art, including textiles, ceramics, metalwork, architectural elements, and manuscripts.

Islamic Designs in Color

By N. Simakoff

Published by Dover Publications (1993) New Edition

Over 160 rich, sumptuous designs, reproduced from rare 19th-century edition. Royalty-free motifs drawn from carpets, tiles, carved wood, plates, decorative painting of buildings and furnishings, metalwork, jewellery and more include geometrics, florals and other designs in many shapes and sizes, with rich selection of borders.

 162 designs on 68 plates

Islamic Geometric Design

By Eric Broug
Published by Thames & Hudson (2003)

The beauty of Islamic geometric designs, and the breathtaking skill of the craftsmen who created them, are admired the world over. The intricacy and artistry of the patterns can seem almost beyond the powers of human ingenuity. In this handsomely illustrated volume, author analyses and explains these complex designs for the first time in their historical and physical context.  Own original drawings accompany magnificent photographs of mosques, madrasas, palaces and tombs from the Islamic world, ranging from North Africa to Iran and Uzbekistan, and from the 8th to the 19th centuries.

The creators of these patterns were usually anonymous and there is little evidence for their working practices, but a close and detailed study of the designs can tell us much. Chapters are devoted to each of the main ‘families’ of geometric design – fourfold, fivefold and sixfold – and to the complex ‘combined’ patterns. Every design is carefully explained, and illustrated with a wealth of stunning photographs and clear, meticulously detailed drawings.

Readers can follow the design processes by which these patterns were created and even 
learn to reproduce and invent geometric patterns for themselves, using exactly the same tools as the Islamic craftsmen of old: a ruler and a pair of compasses.

256 pages, over 800 illustrations

Islamic Geometric Patterns

By Eric Broug
Published by Thames & Hudson (2008)

Traditional Islamic craftsmen weren't mathematicians, they had practical knowledge of geometry, their tools for making geometrical designs were a compass and a ruler. This book uses the same design principle. It demonstrates how Islamic craftsmen would draw a hexagon and a pentagon with only their tools of a compass and a ruler. The method used in this book is new and innovative; it makes it easy for enthusiasts of any age to learn how to make their own designs. 

The book contains twenty different geometrical designs, ranging from simple to complex. All designs are related to a location in the Islamic world where they can be found. For example, there are designs from:

- the Great Mosque of Cordoba, Spain
- the Mustansiriya Mosque in Baghdad, Iraq
- the Esrefoglu Mosque in Beysehir, Turkey
- the Sheikh Abd al-Samad Complex in Natanz, Iran
- the tomb of Bibi Jawindi in Uch, Pakistan
- the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus, Syria
- the Tomb of Jalal al-Din Hussein in Uzgen, Kirgizstan

The book is accompanied with an interactive CD-Rom that contains all twenty designs presented as animations, printable grid paper PDF's, printable colouring designs, interactive photographs and an extensive photo-gallery showing highlights of Islamic geometrical compositions. 

128 pages

Islamic Patterns: An Analytical and Cosmological Approach
  

By Keith Critchlow

Published by Inner Traditions (1999) New Edition

Keith Critchlow is Director of Research and Director of Visual Islamic and Traditional Arts at the Prince of Wales Institute of Architecture. An internationally known lecturer on Islamic art, he is the author of Pythagorean Geometry. He lives in England. 

The classic study of the cosmological principles found in the patterns of Islamic art and how they relate to sacred geometry and the perennial philosophy.

Explains how these patterns guide the mind from the mundane world of appearances to its underlying reality.

For centuries the nature and meaning of Islamic art has been wrongly regarded in the West as mere decoration. In truth, because the portrayal of human and animal forms has always been discouraged on Islamic religious principles that forbid idolatry, the abstract art of Islam represents the sophisticated development of a non naturalistic tradition. Through this tradition, Islamic art has maintained its chief aim: the affirmation of unity as expressed in diversity.

In this fascinating study the author explores the idea that unlike medieval Christian art, in which the polarization of such forms and patterns was relegated to a background against which to set sacred images, the geometrical patterns of Islamic art can reveal the intrinsic cosmological laws affecting all creation. Their primary function is to guide the mind from the mundane world of appearances toward its underlying reality. 

Numerous drawings connect the art of Islam to the Pythagorean science of mathematics, and through these images we can see how an Earth centred view of the cosmos provides renewed significance to those number patterns produced by the orbits of the planets. The author shows the essential philosophical and practical basis of every art creation -whether a tile, carpet, or wall- and how this use of mathematical tessellations affirms the essential unity of all things. An invaluable study for all those interested in sacred art, Islamic Patterns is also a rich source of inspiration for artists and designers.

192 pages with 150 colour and black-and-white drawings of Islamic patterns
 

Islamic Design: A Genius for Geometry

By Daud Sutton

Published by Walker & Company (2007)

Daud Sutton is director of the Thesaurus Islamicus Foundation's design studio Editio Electrum, specializing in the fine reproduction of carpet pages from ancient manuscripts. He lives in England.

An exploration of the construction and meaning of Islamic geometric patterns.

Throughout their long history the craft traditions of the Islamic world evolved a multitude of styles applied to a great variety of media but always with unifying factors that make them instantly recognizable. Harmony is central. There are two key aspects to the visual structure of Islamic design: calligraphy using Arabic script (one of the world's great calligraphic traditions) and abstract ornamentation using a varied but remarkably integrated visual language. Focusing on Islamic geometric patterns, simple and complex, man-made and in nature, this book offers unique insight into Islamic culture.

64 pages 
                                  

Arabic Geometrical Pattern and Design

By J. Bourgoin

Published by Dover Publications (1973) New Edition

Nearly 200 examples exhibit the wide range of Islamic art, including hexagon and octagon  designs, combinations of stars and rosettes, and many variations on other geometric patterns. Twenty-eight examples from traditional sources in Cairo and Damascus include sanctuary doors, openwork windows, and inlaid marble pavements and ceilings.

204 pages