Islamic Arches are Source of Contemporary Architectural Creativity at the Sheikh Zayed Mosque in Abu Dhabi

Abstract

The formulations of the arts and architecture are similar all over the Arab countries, to the point that many art historians see them being linked together in one civilization for the ease of impact and being influenced of each other's art. With the succession of the Islamic ages, the artists have excelled in the art of religious architecture until they arrived at what other artists did not reach in a civilized domain with a distinctive religious character. Therefore, Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan, the Emir of the United Arab Emirates, ordered, in 1998, the construction of a large Islamic mosque in the city of Abu Dhabi in order to preserve the concepts and values of the tolerant Islamic culture to clarify the true message of Islam. The construction of this mosque was completed in 2008 to become the fourth largest mosque in the world. It also appears to be an open exhibition containing material evidence in which the components of the Islamic cultures of general religious character are fused and melted together in the Islamic bays, domes and arches in the Sheikh Zayed Mosque, which achieved the functional and aesthetic aspect so as to emulate the intellectual philosophical framework of the Islamic faith in 3D fine arts combining mass with space and connecting authenticity and originality to contemporaneity and modernity, the problem of the research deals with the interpretation of the phenomenon of creativity in Islamic bays at the Sheikh Zayed Mosque in Abu Dhabi, where this problem in the following question: How can Islamic bays be source of contemporary architectural creativity at the Sheikh Zayed Mosque in Abu Dhabi? The hypothesis of the research supposes that Islamic bays are source of contemporary architectural creativity at the Sheikh Zayed Mosque in Abu Dhabi. The research aims at the importance of communication between Arab cultures by shedding light on the phenomenon of creativity in the Islamic arches at the Sheikh Zayed Mosque, while taking advantage of them in the fields of 3D expression and contemporary interior design. The limits of research are confined to the analysis of arches as a architectural component of the Sheikh Zayed Mosque in Abu Dhabi, while the methodology of the research depends on descriptive analytical method in a theoretical framework. The importance of this research is based on highlighting the aesthetics of formulating Islamic arches at the Sheikh Zayed Mosque in Abu Dhabi,

Keywords

• islamic arches; the system contemporary architectural creativity; the sheikh zayed mosque in abu dhabi