Prof. Dr. Gülru Necipoğlu

Prof. Dr. Gülru Necipoğlu has been the Aga Khan Professor of Islamic Art at Harvard University and Director of the Aga Khan Program for Islamic Architecture since 1993 where she earned her PhD in 1986. She specializes in the medieval and early modern periods, with a particular focus on the Mediterranean basin and Eastern Islamic lands. She has published several books including Architecture, Ceremonial Power: The Topkapi Palace (1991), The Topkapi Scroll, Geometry and Ornament in Islamic Architecture (1995), and The Age of Sinan: Architectural Culture in the Ottoman Empire (2005). Her articles include interpretations of monuments such as the Dome of the Rock, Suleymaniye Mosque and Topkapi Palace, Ottoman visual culture, comparative studies on the three early modern Islamic empires (Safavid, Mughal, Ottoman), as well as artistic exchanges between Byzantium, Renaissance Italy, and the Islamic lands. She is the editor of Muqarnas: An Annual on the Visual Cultures of the Islamic World and Supplements to Muqarnas. Her publications also address questions of pre-modern architectural practice, plans and drawings, the aesthetics of abstract ornament and geometric design. She has received several prizes and honours for her books; her Topkapi Scroll won the Albert Hourani and the Spiro Kostoff book awards. The Age of Sinan has been awarded the Fuat Köprülü Book Prize.

Dr. Necipoğlu is a member of various professional organisations such as the American Philosophical Society, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the College Art Association, the Society of Architectural Historians, the Middle East Studies Association, the Iranian Studies Association, the Turkish Studies Association, the American Research Institute in Turkey, and the Centro Internazionale di Studi di Archittettura Andrea Palladio in Vicenza. She was part of an international board of experts set up by UNESCO to supervise the rebuilding of the Ottoman Bridge of Mostar, Bosnia.

Selected books and edited volumes:
Editor of Muqarnas: An Annual on the Visual Culture of the Islamic World and Supplements to Muqarnas (E.J. Brill, Leiden and Boston) since 1993, Volumes 11-28.
The Topkapı Scroll—Geometry and Ornament in Islamic Architecture, The Getty Center for the History of Art and the Humanities, distributed by Oxford University Press, 1995 (Translated into Persian by Mihrdad Qayyumi Bidhindi, Handasa va Tazyin dar Mi‘mari-yi Islami: Tomar-i Topkapı (Tehran, Kitabkhana-yi Milli-yi Iran, 1379).
Sinan’s Autobiographies: A Critical Edition of Five Sixteenth-Century Texts. Critical Edition and translation by Howard Crane and Esra Akin, edited with a preface by Gülru Necipoğlu (Supplements to Muqarnas, Leiden, 2006).
"Historiography and Ideology: Architectural Heritage in the Lands of Rum", the proceedings of a symposium organized with Dr. Sibel Bozdoğan, held at the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 12 May, 2006 (Published as special issue of Muqarnas, vol. 24, 2007).
Architecture, Ceremonial and Power: The Topkapı Palace in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries, M.I.T. and The Architectural History Foundation, 1991 (translated with revisions into Turkish; translator Ruşen Sezer; 15. ve 16. yüzyılda Topkapı Sarayı: Mimari, Tören ve Iktidar, Yapı ve Kredi Bankası, Istanbul, 2007).
"Frontiers of Islamic Art and Architecture: Essays in Celebration of Oleg Grabar′s Eightieth Birthday", co-edited with Julia Bailey (The Aga Khan Program of Islamic Architecture Thirtieth Anniversary Special Volume: Muqarnas vol. 25, 2008).
The Age of Sinan: Architectural Culture in the Ottoman Empire (Reaktion Books, London, and Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ, 2005, 2010).

Selected articles:
"The Süleymaniye Complex in Istanbul: An Interpretation", Muqarnas 3 (1986): 92–117.
"Plans and Models in 15th and 16th-Century Ottoman Architectural Practice", Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians, September 1986, 224–43.
"The Account Book of a Fifteenth-Century Royal Kiosk", in Raiyyet Rusumu: Essays Presented to Halil Inalcik on his Seventieth Birthday, eds. S. Tekin and G. Alpay-Tekin, Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University, 1987, 31–45.
"Süleyman the Magnificent and the Representation of Power in the Context of Ottoman-Hapsburg-Papal Rivalry”, The Art Bulletin, September 1989 (71): 401–27.
Reprinted in English in Empire and Civilization in the Age of Süleyman the Magnificent, eds. H. Inalcik and C. Kafadar, Istanbul, ISIS Press, 1992.
Revised version reprinted in Spanish as "Solimán el Magnífico y la Representación del Poder" in the exhibition catalog for Carlos V: las Armas y las Letras, Granada, 2000.
"From International Timurid to Ottoman: A Change of Taste in Sixteenth Century Ceramic Tiles", Muqarnas 7 (1991): 136–70.
"A Kanun for the State, a Canon for the Arts: The Classical Synthesis in Ottoman Art and Architecture during the Age of Süleyman", Soliman le Magnifique et son temps, Actes du Colloque de Paris Galeries Nationales du Grand Palais, 7-10 mars 1990, ed. Gilles Veinstein, Rencontres de l′école du Louvre, 1992, 195–216.
"The Life of an Imperial Monument: Hagia Sophia after Byzantium", in Hagia Sophia: From the Age of Justinian to the Present, eds. Robert Mark and Ahmet Cakmak, Cambridge University Press, London, 1992, 195–225.
"Geometric Design in Timurid-Turkmen Architectural Practice: Thoughts on a Recently Discovered Scroll and its Late Gothic Parallels", in Timurid Art and Culture: Iran and Central Asia in the Fifteenth Century, eds. L. Golombek, M. Subtelny, Leiden, 1992, 48–67.
"Framing the Gaze in Ottoman, Safavid, and Mughal Palaces", in Ars Orientalis, Vol. 23 (1993) Gülru Necipoglu, ed. Ann Arbour: Department of History, University of Michigan.
"Challenging the Past: Sinan and the Competitive Discourse of Early Modern Islamic Architecture", Muqarnas 10 (1993), 169–80.
"Dynastic Imprints on the Cityscape: The Collective Message of Funerary Imperial Mosque Complexes in Istanbul", Colloque Internationale: Cimetières et traditions funéraires dans le monde islamique (Institut Français d′études Anatoliennes, Istanbul, September 28–30, 1991), ed. Jean-Louis Bacqué-Grammont, Paris, C.N.R.S, 1996, 23–36.
"The Suburban Landscape of Sixteenth-Century Istanbul as a Mirror of Classical Ottoman Garden Culture",  in Theory and Design of Gardens in the Time of the Great Muslim Empires, ed. A. Petruccioli, E.J. Brill, 1997, 32–71.
"Word and Image in Portraits of the Ottoman Sultans: A Comparative Perspective" in The Sultan’s Portrait: Picturing the House of Osman (Istanbul, 2000), 22–59, 202–207.
"Sinan: Poet of Proportion”, Royal Academy of Arts Magazine (Special Issue: Turks), Winter 2004, number 85, 52–53.
"L’idée de décor dans les régimes de visualité islamiques", in Rémi Labrusse ed., Purs décors? Arts de l’Islam, regards du XIXe siècle. Collections des Arts Décoratifs, exhibition catalogue (Paris, 2007), 10-23.
"Creation of a National Genius: Sinan and the Historiography of ‘Classical’ Ottoman Architecture", Muqarnas 24 (2007): 141-83.
"Qur’anic Inscriptions on Sinan’s Imperial Mosques: A comparison with Their Safavid and Mughal Counterparts" in Word Of God – Art of Man: The Qur’an and its Creative Expressions, ed. Fahmida Suleman (Institute of Ismaili Studies Conference Proceedings, Oxford University Press, 2007), 69-104.
"Religious Inscriptions on the Great Mosques of the Ottoman, Safavid and Mughal Empires", Hadeeth Ad-Dar (Dar al-Athar al-Islamiyyah, Kuwait National Museum, vol. 25, 2008), 34-40.
"The Dome of the Rock as Palimpest: ‘Abd al-Malik’s Grand Narrative and Sultan Süleyman’s Glosses", Muqarnas 25 (2008): 17-105.
"From Byzantine Constantinople to Ottoman Kostantiniyye: Creation of a Cosmopolitan Capital and Visual Culture under Sultan Mehmed II", in Exhibition catalogue: From Byzantion to Istanbul: 8000 Years of a Capital, June 5 - Sept. 4, 2010, Sabanci University Sakip Sabanci Museum, Istanbul.  Istanbul: Sakip Sabanci Museum, 2010.
"The Concept of Islamic Art: Inherited Discourses and New Approaches", in Benoît Junod, Georges Khalil, Stefan Weber and Gerhard Wolf, eds., Islamic Art and the Museum, London: Saqi, 2012. Reproduced by permission of the author and publishers. 6-GN/1; in Journal of Art Historiography, no. 6: special issue, ′Islamic art historiography′.

Reference: isites.harvard.edu, archnet.org, iis.ac.uk