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Muqarnas Vault, Masjid-i Shah/Imam, Isfahan. Source: Daniel C. Waugh, Courtesy of Archnet.org

We talk with Architectural historian Christian Hedrick, currently working at the Aga Khan Documentation Center at MIT as a researcher, visiting lecturer at the School of Architecture at Northeastern University and GAHTC contributor, about the intersection of Islamic architecture with cultures in India, China, North Africa, and Europe. We explore ideas of global exchange, translation and transformation of Islamic forms and materials, such as the pointed arch, as well as brick, stucco, and ornamental ceramic tiles and techniques like haft-rangī. We touch on ideas of Orientalism, and the circulation and representation of Islamic visual material culture in the Abbasid empire and Ummayad dynasty.