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Wednesday 23 May 2012
26 Jan 12 – 15 Apr 12
Bayram b. Ilyas, ivory sundial and Qibla pointer, 1582-83
london. For most of the Western world, and non-Muslims generally, Islam still remains a mystery, making the British Museum’s (BM) exhibition “Hajj: Journey to the Heart of Islam” timely. Every Muslim is obliged, at least once in their life, to go on the Hajj, the pilgrimage to Mecca that takes place during the last month of the Islamic year, known as Dhu’l Hijja. News footage shows seas of migrants visiting what is considered the spiritual heart of Islam, where the prophet Muhammad received the first revelations in the early seventh century. The Ka’ba, the cube-shaped building at the centre of Mecca, which Muslims believe was built by Abraham and his son Ishmael, draws the devout from all over the world. The show is the third in a series of exhibitions at the museum, after “The Ancient Egyptian Book of the Dead” (2010-11) and “Treasures of Heaven” (2011), highlighting spiritual journeys. “Hajj was the obvious next subject, and one that had not been fully addressed in exhibition form before,” says Venetia Porter, the assistant keeper of Islamic and contemporary Middle Eastern art. Conveying the “vastness” of the Hajj, both in a geographical sense and its spiritual dimension, has proved a challenge in the Reading Room space, she adds. Section one charts the major routes used across Africa, Asia, Europe and the Middle East, focusing on a series of cities—Kufa in present-day Iraq, Cairo and Damascus—that acted as “hubs”, for pilgrims crossing the Indian Ocean en route for Jedda, the port of Mecca. Travellers’ experiences of crossing the Darb Zubeyda, the 900-mile land route across Arabia named after the queen and wife of the caliph Harun al-Rashid (around 766-809), are relayed. Mecca itself and the rituals of the Hajj are examined in the second section; objects on show include a rare, late 19th-century silk mahmal, a ceremonial tented structure carried by camels, symbolising a sultan’s status, which is on loan from the Nasser Khalili Collection of Islamic art. The textile curtains used to cover the Ka’ba are also being displayed, and the experience of the Hajj is conveyed through a variety of manuscripts, pilgrimage certificates and pilgrims’ souvenirs. “Interspersed among these traditional objects are the works of contemporary artists evoking their own powerful experience or the idea of Hajj,” says Porter. British artist Idris Khan’s sculptural installation Seven Paths is inspired by his father’s Hajj, while Saudi artist Ayman Yossri Daydban depicts the egalitarian, unifying aspect of the Hajj in We Were All Brothers, 2010, showing a stream of pilgrims dressed the same in a garment of two pieces of unstitched white cloth. Other Saudi artists represented include Reem Al Faisal and Maha Malluh. Lenders include the National Museum and the King Saud University Museum in Riyadh. The bank, HSBC Amanah, is the sponsor. A parallel exhibition of works made by winners of the Create and Inspire competition, a project for emerging Saudi artists supported by the non-profit UK organisation Edge of Arabia, opens at the BM at the same time. Gareth Harris Categories: Middle East
Great Russell Street, London WC1B 3DG, United Kingdom +44 (0)20 7323 8299 www.britishmuseum.org
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