Collections & Research Staff
Karin Ruehrdanz
Curator of Islamic Art
Diploma, Oriental Art and Archaeology, Halle University, Germany, 1971 Ph. D., Halle University, 1974
Karin Ruehrdanz was appointed curator of Islamic Decorative Arts at the Royal Ontario Museum and Professor in the Department of Middle Eastern Civilizations at the University of Toronto in 2007.
Having received her Ph.D., Karin taught Islamic Art and Archaeology at Halle and Bamberg Universities and at the University of Pennsylvania. In 1993/94 she completed her research on illustrated histories of the prophets at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton (published jointly with Rachel Milstein and Barbara Schmitz: Stories of the Prophets: Illustrated Manuscripts of Qisas al-Anbiya’, Costa Mesa: Mazda, 1999). In recent years her research focused on illustrated Arabic and Persian encyclopaedias of natural history, on Central Asian miniature painting, and on the formation of collections of Islamic art in Central Europe since early modern times. Analysis of illustrated Shahnama manuscripts in their cultural contexts remains an ongoing theme in her work, as well as the visual responses to different literary genres.
Publications
| In Press | “The Samarqand Shahnamas (c. 1600) in the context of dynastic change,” in Shahnama Studies, II, ed. Charles Melville, Cambridge. |
| In press | “‘Ein kändlein von schwartzgriener igiada’: Persianate nephrite vessels,” in Cahiers de Studia Iranica, ed. Maria Szuppe, Paris. |
| 2009 | “Miniatures of the Bukharan court atelier in a copy of Khwājū Kirmānī’s Khamsa dated 1087/1667-68,” in Écrit et culture en Asie centrale et dans le monde turco-iranien, Xe-XIXe siècles/Writing and Culture in Central Asia and the Turko-Iranian world, 10th-19th centuries, eds. Francis Richard et Maria Szuppe (=Studia Iranica, cahier 40), Paris, Leuven (Association pour l’avancement des études iraniennes/Peeters), pp. 375-402. |
| 2009 | “Turkish ‘Terra Sigillata’ Vessels from the 16th to 17th Century and Their Counterparts in Europe and the New World” (with Gisela Helmecke). Thirteenth International Congress of Turkish Art, eds. Géza Dávid and Ibolya Gerelyes, Budapest (Hungarian National Museum), pp. 309-322. |
| 2009 | “Cosmography,” in Images of Islamic Science: Illustrated Manuscripts from the Iranian World, eds. Živa Vessel, Sergei Tourkin, Yves Porter, Paris – Tehran (UNESCO), pp. 177-181. |
| 2009 | “Iran und Nordindien: Miniaturmalerei,” in Asiatische Kunst – Impulse für Europa. Grassi Museum für Angewandte Kunst Leipzig, Ständige Ausstellung, Leipzig (Passage-Verlag), pp. 180-187, 2008. |
| 2009 | "Magical Properties. Uncovering the long-forgotten: The potent origins of a simple red jug." ROM Magazine, Fall 2009, pp. 16-19. |
| 2008 | “Fabeltiere des Aleppo-Zimmers vor dem Hintergrund naturhistorischer Kompendien,” in Angels, Peonies, and Fabulous Creatures: The Aleppo Room in Berlin, eds. Julia Gonnella and Jens Kröger, Münster (Rhema), pp. 47-51. | 2008 | "Zwischen Botschaft und Kommerz: zum geistig-kulturellen Hintergrund persischer Illustrationsstile im späten 15. Und frühen 16. Jahrhundert," in Iran und iranisch geprägte Kulturen: Studien zum 65. Geburtstag von Bert G. Fragner, eds. M. Ritter, R. Kauz, B. Hoffmann, Wiesbaden, pp. 377-388, Taf. 6-8. |
| 2006 | “Exotic Decoration and Cosmological Symbolism: Chinoiserie Drawings from the Diez Albums in the Context of Early Timurid Cosmographies,” in The Phenomenon of “Foreign” in Oriental Art, ed. A. Hagedorn, Wiesbaden: Reichert, pp. 89-102. |
| 2006 | “Der Text über die Dämonen und seine Illustrationen in ‘Aja’ib al-Makhluqat-Handschriften vom 14.-17. Jahrhundert,” in Studies in Oriental Art and Culture in Honour of Professor Tadeusz Majda, ed. A. Parzymies, Warsaw, pp. 269-284. |
| 2005 | “Populäre Naturkunde illustriert: Text und Bild in persischen ‘Aja’ib-Handschriften spätjala’iridischer und frühtimuridischer Zeit,” Studia Iranica 34, pp. 231-256. |
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University of Toronto, Near and Middle Eastern Civilizations Faculty
Contact Information
Department of World Cultures
Royal Ontario Museum
100 Queen's Park
Toronto, ON
M5S 2C6
Tel: 416.586.5692
Fax: 416.586.5877
E-mail: Karin Ruehrdanz or
World Cultures
Karin Ruehrdanz
