Venetia Porter: Word Into Art: Artists of the Modern Middle East (2006)

This landmark catalogue is one of “the most comprehensive gatherings of Middle Eastern artists that has been undertaken in recent times.” Based on an exhibition mounted by the British Museum, it is “devoted to the recurring theme of calligraphy and how artists from the Middle East and North Africa use the traditional visual vocabulary of Arabic letters as a point of departure and an integral expressive element. The works, which were drawn mostly from the British Museum’s own collection of contemporary Islamic art, demonstrate how each artist celebrates the aesthetic powers and plasticity of the letters, while simultaneously pushing the boundaries, even sometimes subverting traditional canons. The artists manipulate letters, often transforming them beyond recognition, using ingenious and innovative methods, materials, styles, and daring compositions. Some use letters for purely aesthetic reasons, while others use them more instrumentally as writing, signs, or ciphers that allow the artists to grapple with issues of socio-political orientation and cultural and religious identity. For some artists this resonates with the sacred tradition of Islam and the Qur’an, while for others it is an undeniable part of their cultural heritage and a natural vehicle for expression.” (Sourced from the two reviews linked below.)

Foreword by Saeb Eigner
With contributions by Isabelle Caussé
Publisher British Museum Press, London, 2006
ISBN 0714111635, 9780714111636
144 pages
via IslamicManuscripts.info

Reviews: Islamic Monthly (2006), Maryam Ekhtiar (CAA Reviews 2007).

Publisher
Exhibition
WorldCat

PDF (124 MB)

Branko Vučićević: Paper Movies (1998–) [Serbo-Croatian, English]

“Paper Movies predstavlja prvo domače srečanje z igrivo in lucidno mislijo vsestranskega erudita, cinefila, zlasti pa tudi poznavalca zgodovine avantgardnih gibanj: slikovita knjižica z metodo filmsko-literarnega kolaža zariše obrise svojevrstnega »kina z drugimi sredstvi«, ki se zaključuje in nadaljuje v mediju tiskane besede.”

Publisher Arkzin, Zagreb, and B 92, Belgrade, 1998
Anti-copyright
ISBN 867963090X (Bgd), 9536542056 (Zgb)
79 pages
via MemoryoftheWorld, via Dejan Kršić

WorldCat

PDF, PDF (Serbo-Croatian, 1998)
Excerpts (English, trans. Greg de Cuir, Jr., 2014)

See also Pavle Levi’s Cinema by Other Means, 2012.
More on Vučićević.

Rens Bod, Jaap Maat, Thijs Weststeijn (eds.): The Making of the Humanities, Vol. 3: The Modern Humanities (2014)

“This comprehensive history of the humanities focuses on the modern period (1850-2000). The contributors, including Floris Cohen, Lorraine Daston and Ingrid Rowland, survey the rise of the humanities in interaction with the natural and social sciences, offering new perspectives on the interaction between disciplines in Europe and Asia and new insights generated by digital humanities.”

Publisher Amsterdam University Press, Amsterdam, 2014
Creative Commons BY-NC 3.0 License
ISBN 9789089645166
724 pages

Conference
Publisher
OAPEN

PDF, PDF (6 MB, updated on 2022-12-20)
Volumes 1-2