Ahmed Karahisarî ( -1556)

Calligraphic exercises

Exercises known as karalama or meşk kept the calligrapher’s hand in practice and allowed him to experiment with new styles. Inexperienced calligraphers learned how to write characters correctly by doing these exercises. Another aspect is revealed by the fact that some karalama are signed, illuminated, and bound in carefully produced albums, showing that they were valued as original works in their own right that reflected the spirit of a master calligrapher at a moment of artistic freedom.1 The calligrapher sometimes wrote adages from hadith, just ‘scribbled’ letters randomly, or formed them into compositions. The karalama exhibited here is by the celebrated calligrapher Karahisarî, and consists of repetitions of literary sayings and adages. The colophon reads Meşekahu’l-abdu ahmeduhu Ahmedü’l-Karahisarî (exercises by Ahmed Karahisarî, his servant who gives thanks), suggesting that this karalama was carefully designed. The page is set in a narrow gold frame and tiny gold roses are scattered in the spaces between the letters and words.

Detail

Title:

Artist:

Ahmed Karahisarî ( -1556)

Dimensions:

35 x 26.3 cm

Medium:

Sized paper, black ink

Location:

Sabancı Üniversitesi Sakıp Sabancı Müzesi (Emirgan, İstanbul, Türkiye)

Credit:

Exhibition History

Blind Date - İstanbul

Calligraphic exercises

Detail

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