Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Fine Examples of Islamic Calligraphy
Beit al-Quran, Manama
Tareq Rajab Museum, Kuwait City
Museum of Islamic Art, Doha
Sharjah Museum of Islamic Civilisation, Shajah
The one 'art form' that a visitor to the Peninsula can hardly miss is the modern tower
block. In many Gulf cities, cranes almost outnumber buildings in the race to build the
most extravagant confection of glass and steel. In the process, Peninsula architecture has
become diverted from the traditional principle of functionality. Take the magnificent
Emirates Palace in Abu Dhabi, for example, where you need to pack your trainers to get
from bed to breakfast.
Increasingly, architects are expected to refer, in an almost talismanical way, to the visu-
al vocabulary of Arab art: hence the pointed windows, false balconies, wooden screens
and tent motifs of modern buildings across the Peninsula. Perhaps this is because many
traditional buildings, with their economy of style and design, achieve something that mod-
ern buildings often do not - they blend in harmoniously with their environment.
THE ART OF AIR CONTROL
Called
barjeel
in Arabic, wind towers are the Gulf States' own unique form of non-electrical air-conditioning. In
most of the region's cities a handful still exist, sometimes attached to private homes, and sometimes carefully pre-
served or reconstructed at museums. In Sharjah (UAE) a set of massive wind towers is used to cool the modern
Central Market building.
Traditional wind towers rise 5m or 6m above a house. They are usually built of wood or stone but can also be
made from canvas. The tower is open on all four sides and so can catch even the breathiest of breezes. These
mere zephyrs are channelled down a central shaft and into the room below. In the process, the air speeds up and is
cooled. The cooler air already in the tower shaft pulls in and subsequently cools the hotter air outside through a
simple process of convection.
Sitting beneath a wind tower on a hot and humid day, the temperature is noticeably cooler with a consistent
breeze even when the air outside feels heavy and still.
Islamic Art
There can be no greater example of function at the heart of art than Islamic art. For a
Muslim, Islamic art remains first and foremost an expression of faith, and to this day
people are cautious of 'art for art's sake', or art as an expression of the self without refer-
ence to community. Ask Arab students to draw a picture, and they'll often draw
something with a message or a meaning rather than just a pretty picture.
