Roundtable on Islamic Art

Although very widely used, the phrase “Islamic art” has been the subject of considerable discussion and negotiation in recent years. In this roundtable, panelists will engage questions that relate the use of the phrase Islamic art to artistic practice on a worldwide scale. We wish to take seriously both the materiality of objects and installations that constitute art, and intellectual patterns and sociopolitical relations that lead to art’s production. Moving beyond any kind of sterile concern with definitions, we will explore how producers, evaluators, buyers, and viewers of art today are likely to interpret the term Islamic art, and illustrate a diverse set of perspectives that, in turn, will reflect on aesthetics, the relationship between the present and the past, and personal and collective identities in the world today.