Hajj: Journey to the Heart of Islam

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Hajj: Journey to the Heart of Islam
17th- or 18th-century Hajj certificate showing the Kaaba within the Masjid al-Haram
Date26 January – 15 April 2012 (2012-01-26 – 2012-04-15)[1]
VenueBritish Museum
TypeArt exhibition
ThemeHajj

Hajj: Journey to the Heart of Islam was an exhibition held at the

David Khalili's family trust, which lent many objects that would later be part of the Khalili Collection of Hajj and the Arts of Pilgrimage
.

The exhibition was formally opened by

Tropenmuseum in Amsterdam
to stage their own hajj-themed exhibitions with contributions from the Khalili Collection.

An exhibition catalogue with essays about the hajj, edited by Venetia Porter, was published by the British Museum in 2012, along with a shorter illustrated guide to the hajj. An academic conference, linked to the exhibition, resulted in another book about the topic.

Background: The Hajj

Main article: Hajj
refer to caption
Panorama of Mecca, c. 1845
Neil MacGregor, director of the British Museum: "It would have been impossible to tell this story without those great works of art from David [Khalili]'s collection [...] [T]his exhibition will allow, I hope, a new set of people to understand what hajj is."

The hajj (

Muslims. It is a mandatory religious duty that must be carried out at least once in their lifetime by all adult Muslims who are physically and financially capable of undertaking the journey, and can support their family during their absence.[3][4] At the time of the exhibition, the journey was being made by three million pilgrims each year.[5]

The hajj is one of the

Mohammed is said to have preached his last sermon), and ramy al-jamarāt (stoning of the Devil).[3][9]
Of the five pillars, the hajj is the only one not open to non-Muslims,[10] since Mecca is restricted to Muslims only.[11] Over the centuries, the hajj and its destination the Kaaba have inspired creative works in many media, including literature, folk art, and photography.[2]

Preparation and launch

There had been no previous major exhibitions devoted to the hajj.

David Khalili's family trust.[18] Preparation for the event included promotion to Muslim communities.[10] Khan collected photographs, recordings, and souvenirs during her own hajj in 2010,[12][19][20] and assisted with community outreach.[10]

The exhibition was presented in partnership with the

Abdulaziz bin Abdullah travelled from Saudi Arabia to represent his father, the custodian of the Two Holy Mosques, at this opening ceremony.[21]

Content

rectangular textile embroidered with many pieces of Arabic text
Sitara for the door of the Kaaba, 1263 AH (1846–1847 AD)

The exhibition was held in the circular

anticlockwise walk around the Kaaba that is a core ritual of the hajj.[24] An early section illustrated the preparations traditionally taken before a hajj, which can include settling debts and preparing a will. Before trains and air travel, a hajj pilgrimage could take many months and involve a significant risk of death either from transmissible disease or bandits.[24] Also displayed in this section were examples of ihram clothing: white clothes that mark the spiritual purpose and collective unity of hajj pilgrims.[25]

The bulk of the content was organised around three themes: pilgrimage routes, the rituals of the hajj, and Mecca.[22] The first section described five different pilgrimage routes towards Mecca: the traditional routes through Arabia, North Africa, the Ottoman Empire, and Asia, plus the modern route by air from Britain. It thus contrasted the early pilgrims' arduous, risky journey across desert or ocean with the ease of modern travel.[25][11]

Pilgrimages of past centuries were illustrated by manuscripts of hajj-related literature, including the Anis Al-Hujjaj, the Dala'il al-Khayrat, the Shahnameh, the Futuh al-Haramayn, and the Jami' al-tawarikh.[26] Mansa Musa, king of the Mali Empire, travelled to Mecca in 1324 with 60,000 courtiers as atonement for accidentally killing his mother; he was depicted in a panel from a 14th-century Catalan Atlas.[27][5] The importance of Mecca to Muslims was illustrated by these ancient maps and diagrams as well as by qibla compasses which help devotees turn towards the city, which they are required to do for prayer.[24][28]

The stories of individual historical pilgrims were told through diaries and photographs. These included Westerners such as the explorer

Ma Fuchu and a 13th-century manuscript of the Maqamat al-Hariri story collection.[26] One of the earliest surviving Qurans was on display: an 8th-century manuscript lacking the decorative calligraphy associated with later versions.[13]

A seven-minute video illustrated the rituals of the hajj.

Saudi currency, protecting the pilgrim from exchange rate fluctuations.[26]

The section on Mecca used past and present photographs and paintings to show how the mosque surrounding the Kaaba (the Masjid al-Haram) has been modernised to make space for much larger numbers of pilgrims, resulting in some ancient buildings being demolished.[25] The 19th-century photographs included some by Muhammad Sadiq of holy sites in Mecca and Christiaan Snouck Hurgronje's portraits of pilgrims.[26]

Towards the end of the exhibition were several pieces of contemporary art, including works by Ahmed Mater, Idris Khan, Walid Siti, Kader Attia, Ayman Yossri, and Abdulnasser Gharem.[31][24][26][29] A final section played audio testimonies of British hajj pilgrims[10] and invited guests to write down their own reflections.[11]

Reception and legacy

The museum's target of 80,000 visitors was quickly exceeded. By the end of the run, 119,948 adult tickets had been sold (children had free entry and were not counted).[10] According to the British Museum's annual report, educational events connected to the exhibition attracted nearly 32,000 participants.[32] Forty-seven percent of visitors were Muslims.[33] Some non-Muslim visitors reported that overhearing Muslim families' conversations or striking up conversations with them, helped them appreciate the spiritual importance of the hajj.[25]

In surveys, 89% of attendees reported emotional or spiritual reactions such as reflection on faith.[34] Steph Berns, a doctoral researcher at the University of Kent, interviewed attendees and found a small minority for whom contemplating the artefacts or personal testimonies induced a sense of closeness to God.[35] The aspects of the exhibition most often remarked on by visitors were the personal accounts of hajj pilgrims in the video, photographs, and textual diaries.[25] The artifacts that attracted the most visitor comments were the textiles and contemporary art pieces.[36] Berns observed that, for most visitors, the exhibition could not fully reproduce the personal and emotional experience of the hajj, which is crucially connected to the specific location of Mecca. She described this as an unavoidable result of presenting the topic within a museum thousands of miles away.[25]

In

The Londonist praised an "eye-opening and fascinating" exhibition that demystified an aspect of Islam poorly understood by most of the public.[23] Brian Sewell in the Evening Standard described the exhibition as "of profound cultural importance", praising it as an example of "what multiculturalism should be – information, instruction and understanding, academically rigorous, leaving both cultures (the enquiring and the enquired) intact".[37] For The Diplomat, Amy Foulds described the first part of the exhibition as very interesting but felt that the section about Mecca was anti-climactic, though somewhat redeemed by the contemporary art pieces.[11] Reviewing for The Arts Desk, Fisun Guner awarded four out of five stars to "an exhibition about faith that even an avowed atheist might find rather moving [...] as we read and listen to the words of believers experiencing what must be seen for them not only as an encounter with God but a deep sense of connection with fellow Muslims".[24] For The Independent, Arifa Akbar, who went on hajj in 2006, found it "utterly refreshing" to see a focus on personal experiences of the hajj rather than the politics of Islam and how it is perceived by non-Muslims. She observed that a museum visit is unavoidably dry compared to the intense experience of joining the throng around the Kaaba, but praised the curators' originality and courage in tackling the subject. For Akbar, the highlights included the 8th-century Quran and a sitara.[13] Also in The Independent, Jenny Gilbert found the logistical details of travel – a "dry" topic for those not already interested in manuscript maps – less appealing than the colourful accounts of historical and modern pilgrims.[5]

The journalist and broadcaster

British Muslim. "And yet", he wrote, "the exhibition does illuminate the magnetic appeal of the hajj – of knowing that hundreds of millions have visited the site and completed the same rituals."[38] The scholar of religion Karen Armstrong recommended the exhibition as an antidote to Western stereotypes of Islam that focus on violence and extremism. She described it as an insight into how the vast majority of Muslims view and practise their religion.[39] For the Sunday Times art critic Waldemar Januszczak, an exhibition on a topic for which there is relatively little visual material was "heroic" and showed a determination to help visitors understand the world. He drew a parallel with exhibitions of conceptual art; since texts rather than visual art played a crucial role, "so much of the extraordinary story line laid out for us [...] takes place in the mind". Among the visual art, he singled out the textiles as providing "a visceral artistic buzz to the display".[29]

In

Saudi royal family, including deaths at the hajj (by violence or by incompetent crowd control) and the destruction of buildings in Mecca where Mohammad and his family had lived.[40] The museum responded that the Saudi royal family had not funded the exhibition and had no curatorial control.[10] Jonathan Jones responded to Cohen, defending the five-star review he had given. For Jones, the exhibition was driven not by political or theological goals but by a genuine enthusiasm for the beauty and significance of Islamic culture. That some exhibits had come from Saudi Arabia was, in his view, not significant.[41]

  • refer to caption
    Illustration of a North African pilgrim caravan from the Anis Al-Hujjaj, 17th century
  • refer to caption
    Mahmal cover in red silk, late 19th century
  • refer to caption
    Section from the curtain of the prophet's tomb, 18th century

Publications

depiction of the Kaaba surrounded by calligraphy
Cover of the 2022 book

Two books resulted directly from the exhibition, both edited by Venetia Porter. Hajj: Journey to the Heart of Islam is an exhibition catalogue that also includes interdisciplinary essays explaining the history, culture, and religious significance of the hajj. The authors include Karen Armstrong,

Muhammad Abdel-Haleem, Hugh N. Kennedy, Robert Irwin, and Ziauddin Sardar. The Art of Hajj is a shorter book describing Mecca, Medina, and the rituals of the hajj with visual examples.[1] Qamar Adamjee, a curator at the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco, described both books as accessible to a broad audience while covering many different aspects of the subject.[1]

An academic conference was held in conjunction with the exhibition from 22 to 24 March.[15] Its proceedings, including thirty papers on different aspects of the hajj, were published by the British Museum in 2013 as The Hajj: Collected Essays, edited by Venetia Porter and Liana Saif.[42]

The Khalili Collection of Hajj and the Arts of Pilgrimage subsequently expanded into a five-thousand-object collection documenting the Islamic holy sites of Mecca and Medina. In 2022 it was published in a single illustrated volume by Qaisra Khan, who had co-curated the London exhibition and had become the curator of Hajj and the Arts and Pilgrimage at the Khalili Collections.[43][44] An eleven-volume catalogue is scheduled for publication in 2023.[45]

Related exhibitions

The success of Hajj: Journey to the Heart of Islam prompted museums and art institutions in other countries to inquire about hosting hajj-themed exhibitions. It was not possible for the London exhibition to go on tour; it had involved special loans from 40 different sources, arranged by years of negotiation. Instead, these institutions created exhibitions on the theme of the hajj using items loaned by the Khalili Collection, among other collections.

Tropenmuseum in Amsterdam from January 2019 to February 2020. This combined objects from Dutch collections with the Khalili Collection objects that had been exhibited in London.[48]

See also

References

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  10. ^ a b c d e f g "The Hajj – Journey to the Heart of Islam". Kashmir Observer. 27 September 2012. Retrieved 1 September 2022.
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  22. ^ a b "Hajj: Journey to the Heart of Islam". Time Out London. 11 October 2012. Retrieved 1 September 2022.
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  36. ^ Berns 2015, p. 151.
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  40. ^ Cohen, Nick (18 March 2012). "Keep corrupt regimes out of British culture". The Guardian. Retrieved 2 September 2022.
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Sources

External links

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