Ramadan 2017: Follow the Holy Quran calligraphy script

As the Ramadan Forum for Holy Quran Calligraphy draws to a close in Dubai, we find out from the participants why the art form is considered one of the most important Islamic cultural activities.

Calligraphy artists take part in the ninth annual Ramadan Forum for Holy Quran Calligraphy. Pawan Singh / The National

With his head bowed and a look of intense concentration on his face, Ahmed Kocak balances a reed pen in his hand and carefully makes several tiny brushstrokes of black ink over the same thin black line.

He has spent three months working on this particular piece, but this is a craft he has been practising for 15 years.

Kocak, a former industrial engineer from Turkey, is one of 30 calligraphers taking part in the ninth annual Ramadan Forum for Holy Quran Calligraphy, which began at Dubai’s Festival City on Sunday.

Each artist has been selected for their exceptional, individual talent and, during the past three months, they have been working on writing out one part of the Quran, which is divided into 30 parts, or juz.

When their work is put together at the forum, the Quran will be presented in its entirety.

“It is part of my religion to learn to write and beautify the words of Allah,” says Kocak, who is working on the 23rd juz. “In the art of calligraphy, you can find magic. It takes you to a place deep within your soul – a place where I find divinity.”

The forum was inaugurated by Sheikh Nahyan bin Mubarak Al Nahyan, Minister of Culture and Knowledge Development, who says the event has brought the UAE to the attention of the international community of calligraphers and added to the development of the more complex scripts.

Each calligrapher is tasked with writing out their juz in Al Thuluth script, widely regarded as the most difficult to render.

Fatima Saeed Al Bagali is one of two female calligraphers taking part in the forum, and the only Emirati. She began studying the art form in 1994 and still travels to Istanbul to study under Hassan Chalabi, a master teacher. She is the first woman in the Gulf region to gain a master’s degree in Al Thuluth script, as well as Al Naskh – another very technical style.

She says her accolades are the result of a lot of hard work.

“Calligraphy is my life and my passion,” she says. “I consider it the highest form of art and I work very hard to make my work special. I look at it from an academic standpoint and it raises my thinking. It also brings me closer to God and for that I am thankful.”

Nuria Garcia Masip is the other female contributor. She is Spanish but lives in Paris, and has been learning calligraphy since 2000. When she began, she says her teachers never made her feel as if she was working in a male-dominated world but, when she began her professional career, she realised that she was greatly outnumbered.

“I do have to work harder because I am a woman but, like any calligrapher, I fell in love with the art and I cannot stop,” she says, adding that it offers her a spiritually rewarding experience.

“There is a spiritual dimension to it, because you give your soul to it,” she says. “And with calligraphy, the more you do it, the smaller you feel and the more you realise there is to learn.”

During the forum, which comes to a close tonight, the calligraphers will all be judged on their talents, vying for five awards.

Leading the jury is one of the world’s most famous calligraphers, Turkish master Mohammed Ozcay. He says that events such as these are crucial for the art.

“Calligraphy is the most important cultural activity in the Islamic world,” he says. “And it is through these forums that we have managed to locate the best talent from around the world.

“To have them in competition with each other is vital in elevating the standard of calligraphy internationally and I hope that with every year that goes by, the quality gets better and better.”

Alongside the forum, an exhibition of pieces of illumination and ornamentation from the International Burda Award were on show to complement the text work.

The award, an annual event to celebrate the birthday of the Prophet Mohammed, was launched this year.

Pieces of work from the illumination, or “zakhrafa”, contest are lining the walls of the conference centre where the calligraphy competition is taking place, transforming the whole room into a celebration of the sacred text and prophets.

The final night of the Ramadan Forum for Holy Quran Calligraphy tarts this evening at 10pm and runs until 2am at the InterContinental Hotel, Dubai Festival City.