Images of Thought: Visuality in Islamic India 1550-1750 - Hardcover

Gregory Minissale

9781847180735: Images of Thought: Visuality in Islamic India 1550-1750

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1847180736 ISBN 13: 9781847180735

Publisher: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2006

Images of Thought is an entirely new approach to understanding non-Western art. Supported by a wide reading in anthropology, theology and philosophy, it provides an intellectual context for reading the visual language of Indian and Persian miniature art. By decoding artistic conventions, and with searching visual analyses, the book attempts to transform our understanding of art as an illustration of history to art as a reflection of the intellect. Images of Thought should be of interest to the general reader, students and scholars of art and critical theory, as it shows that one of the world's richest painting traditions can offer important insights into issues of visual perception and intellectual production generally.

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About the Author:

Gregory Minissale completed his PhD in art history at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London. Co-editor of Drain, a journal of contemporary art, he taught at graduate and undergraduate levels in the US for several years before returning to the UK to lecture at the University of Reading and London Metropolitan University. He is now an independent scholar.

Review:

"Images of Thought, centrally focused on Islamic art, is an integrated study of visuality in the art of India, Persia and Europe [...] Minissale's systematic interpretation of the visual language and subject matter of a Mughal miniature adds to our knowledge. His methodical description of the constituents of composition explained by the demarcated lines delineated on the figures reflects his remarkable understanding of the visual arts. Minissale has endeavoured to read the whole aesthetic experience of Persian and Mughal painting [...] In explaining the visual language of the Mughal miniatures accommodating European signs and symbols Minissale goes further than the analyses of Richard Ettinghausen, Robert Skelton and Ebba Koch." -Som Prakash Verma, Journal of Islamic Studies, May 2008; Vol. 19, No. 2

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