What is “Islamic art”? This question has remained open since the term was coined by Western art historians in the 19th century. The debate is alive and well today among scholars who are reassessing the field of Islamic art and grappling with its contemporary manifestations. Can it be defined by a particular time period or geographical region? Is it still being made today? These were some of the questions raised by the team at the Diriyah Biennale Foundation as we embarked on putting together the world’s first Islamic Arts Biennale in Jeddah in 2023.
The rationale for launching an Islamic Arts Biennale in Saudi Arabia was simple. The Kingdom is home to the holy sites of Mecca and Medina, which have been meeting points for Muslims from across the world for more than 13 centuries. Saudi Arabia was the point of origin, from which Islam, and by extension, Islamic Arts traversed the world.
Yet we faced a complex task in determining what would constitute Islamic art and how to present it. After much debate, we concluded that rather than impose our own parameters on Islamic art—a nomenclature that has given rise to many misconceptions—the biennale should strive to collapse ideas of temporality and periodicity on themselves. The goal was to create an exhibition in the likeness of the Islamic world, one that is complex, diverse, and ever-evolving.
We worked with institutions, contemporary artists, curators, and researchers to show what Islamic art had been historically, to explore what is it today, and hopefully, to inspire what it can be in the future.
Mounted under the grand canopies of the Hajj Terminal in Jeddah, a 20th-century architectural masterpiece, the exhibition opens at the start of a Muslim pilgrim’s journey. Beginning here enables visitors to experience Islamic art at the gateway to Mecca, as if embarking on their own pilgrimage.
Their journey covers the historic and the contemporary, celebrating the diverse influences that have shaped Islamic cultures and global civilisations over time. This entwining of the past and present seeks to provoke some of the same questions that are guiding artists, art historians and curators as they re-examine Islamic art’s place in the world.
The AlMusalla at the 2025 Islamic Arts Biennale Photo by Marco Cappelletti, courtesy of the Diriyah Biennale Foundation
The biennale’s inaugural edition in 2023 was titled Awwal Bait, “first house” in Arabic, in reference to the centrality of the Kaaba in Mecca. The theme celebrated the daily and yearly rituals that have been integral to Islam throughout its history, and that continue to shape Islamic life today. It is impossible not to feel the allure of the transcendental in Mecca. By attracting millions of pilgrims from all over the world to worship, it simultaneously inspires diversity and oneness. It is at once constant and ever-changing. The first biennale leaned into these paradoxes as inspiration.
In 2023 we showcased two marble columns that once stood at the Safa Gate of the Grand Mosque in Mecca. They were added during the reign of Abbasid ruler Al-Mahdi in the eighth century and were created to evoke the path the Prophet Muhammad took on his “farewell pilgrimage”. We placed these historic objects beside a contemporary wall installation by the artist Ayman Yossri Daydban that highlighted the ihram—traditional white cloths worn by male pilgrims as they begin their journey to Mecca. He elevated these garments on simple wooden frames to represent the lifting of spirits as pilgrims reach the Grand Mosque.
Displaying these ancient and contemporary objects side by side was very intentional. The marble columns, brought to Mecca from Greater Syria and Egypt, and adorned with calligraphy by the people of Kufa in Iraq, are a testament to the diversity of the Islamic world. When pilgrims don their ihram, they remove all socioeconomic markers of their worldly identities. They become one and the same. Although their expressions are vastly different, both works highlight diversity that is unified in the service of Islam. Such juxtapositions are not gratuitous, they are intended to open a layered dialogue between past and present, between faith and practice, and most importantly, between Islam and the world.
In January, we opened the second edition titled Wama Bainahuma (“And all that is in Between”). This edition builds on the success of the first by expanding institutional participation, exhibiting never-before-displayed artifacts from Mecca, such as the Kiswah, the cover of the Kaaba, and integrating architecture through the AlMusalla architectural prize. Most critically, the 2025 Islamic Arts Biennale celebrates the plurality of Islamic arts, in context. Textiles, manuscripts, astrolabes, prayer spaces, and artworks are brought back together to reflect the ways of life of Muslims from all over the world.
The 2025 biennale includes participation from more than 30 global cultural institutions that are contributing loan objects from across the United States, the United Kingdom, Uzbekistan, Spain, Portugal, Egypt, Indonesia, Tunisia and more. This broad representation underscores the diversity of the Islamic world and the far reaching influences of Islamic Arts. Just as exhibiting these objects in the birthplace of Islam adds to the legacy of the biennale, so too does it add to the legacy of the objects. Here, they touch the lives of thousands of visitors who see parts of their own identities and experiences within them. Here, they can inspire new classes of artists and scholars to add their reflections to this growing medium. Here, they gain a new life.
It is one of the ambitions of the Diriyah Biennale Foundation, chaired by the Saudi culture minister, Prince Bader Al Saud, to breathe new life into the ways we study and present Islamic art. Each year, the holy site of Mecca draws millions of visitors and pilgrims from across the world. They come with their own unique perspectives, worship alongside a diverse group of believers and they are exhaled anew. At the gateway to Mecca, we hope the biennale’s visitors will go on their own journey: bringing their own perspectives, having them challenged or expanded, and leaving transformed.
From the 7th century, to this present moment, artists, creatives, and scholars continue to express their identity and culture through Islamic arts. Each addition or reinterpretation forms a new thread in the growing tapestry of a shared culture. Art that is informed by the teachings and experiences of the Muslim world has something to teach us all. It reveals a multifaceted history of a diverse people while also connecting us to our most basic human quality: the desire to understand the world around us, our place in it, and all that is in between.
Rakan Altouq is Saudi Arabia's assistant minister of culture
