World Bulletin/News Desk

The San Antonio Museum of Art is currently hosting the Jameel Prize: Art Inspired by Islamic Tradition exhibition. The exhibition explores the dialogue between Islamic artistic traditions and contemporary practice and informs a broader debate about Islamic culture.

The Jameel Prize is a £25,000 international art prize inaugurated by the Victoria and Albert Museum (V &A) in London in 2009.

Nearly 200 submissions were received. The ten finalists whose work is on display are of Pakistani, Iranian, Iraqi, Egyptian and Algerian origins.

Several of the artists have lived or live in the United States and explore the notion of assimilation and the socio-cultural issues that arise from living in both the Middle East and the West.

The winning work, Rachid Koraïchi's Les Maîtres Invisibles (Invisible Masters), consists of a series of cotton appliqué banners, which incorporate the ancient traditions of Islamic script and textile arts into a modern work.

Koraïchi uses Arabic calligraphy and symbols from a range of other languages to explore the legacies of the 14 great mystics of Islam.

The Jameel Prize is awarded every two years and the exhibition is organized by the V &A in partnership with Abdul Latif Jameel Community Initiatives.

The exhibition is on view through August 11, 2013. 

Source: Globe Newswire