Introduction

There is a prominent phrase in the hadith used by the Prophet Muhammad صلى الله عليه وسلم which is oft quoted in relation to the arts: ‘Allah is Beautiful and He likes beauty’ (Mukhtasar Sahih Muslim 2000, vol. 1: 65). Religious faith coexists with secularity in the lifeworld of Muslim artists, art-making and the contemporary art world. However, there are historic and contested issues of categorisation around what has commonly been termed Islamic art, and the continued politics of representation that shapes distinctions made between Islamic religious art and ‘international’ contemporary art. Informed by the voices of Muslim women artists, this chapter seeks to trouble these distinctions. I explore how the marginalisation of religion within art discourse has led to a narrowing of notions of modernity, unchecked barriers to the art establishment, and perpetuated a nativist notion of ‘authenticity’ for minority artists and their artwork. I discuss the breadth of how notions of Muslimness and Islamic principles in art travel to and are circulated in different art spaces and contexts, and the continued politics of knowledge production around how artists and artworks are represented within the Western art world.

A defining feature of Islamic art, as it is commonly termed, is the repetition of patterns and order. In mirroring nature, patterns such as calligraphy, geometry and arabesque (or stylised floral patterns) are intended to follow universal mathematical principles, and to resonate aesthetically with Muslim, other religious or non-religious people alike. Most associated with compass or straight edge work in two- or three-dimensional form, Islamic art is traditionally decorative or functional. In the history of Western art, craft practices have often been viewed pejoratively for their perceived associations with repetition rather than originality, domestic labour and household objects. In the Qur’an and hadith there is no direct reference to ‘art’; no word in Arabic or Persian exists for art in the Western sense. Outside of value distinctions made between design and art, most discussed in contemporary discourse, and arguably misunderstood, are tensions in the treatment of form and makers within the Qur’an and hadith. In the Qur’an there is no direct condemnation of image-making (of animals or human form). However, there are negative references to image-making as sinful documented in the hadith. These references are made to representations of animate life in paintings, sculpture and textiles (hangings and cushions).