Gateway to art

Faculty of Fine Arts

Talking About Art

Art History & Visual Studies

A Greek Shadow Puppet

A Greek Shadow Puppet

Why does a famous character in a Greek popular entertainment have a Turkish name? This talk discusses a shadow puppet made in southern Greece, and looks at the ways in which this type of theatre circulated around the eastern Mediterranean region.Shadow puppets made by...

read more
A Woodcut Map of Cairo

A Woodcut Map of Cairo

How did printed maps communicate ideas to the readers of books in the sixteenth century? This talk surveys the information contained in an early map of Cairo and considers the ways in which it would have stimulated the imaginations of readers in the sixteenth...

read more
Bosra street, Syria

Bosra street, Syria

How did the arrival of Christianity and then Islam transform the Classical cities of the Middle East? This talk takes you to the historic city of Bosra in the basalt desert of Syria.view of the Mosque of Umar, Bosra.Colonnaded street in Bosra, Syriaview of the Mosque...

read more
Two Syrian Coins

Two Syrian Coins

What can coins tell us about the evolution of religious and political ideas in new states? This talk looks at two coins minted in the early decades of the Islamic empire in the seventh century, and considers their links to the coins made by the Byzantine empire of...

read more