Saudi Arabia · Painting & Manuscript Arts
Tazhib (تذهيب, from the Arabic for gold; Turkish tezhip)
The illumination of pages with gold and color on a framework of geometric pattern drawn by hand with a two-legged compass and a straight ruler. A design starts from a single circle, which is divided into regular polygons, then stars, a sub-grid and finally the full pattern, a sequence practitioners often work through as a series of 'progressional' drawings. Gold leaf is crushed with gum arabic into a fine paste, sieved through silk, brushed on and burnished with an agate-tipped tool until it shines. The discipline passes from master to student; in the Istanbul tradition the highest stage is the ijaza (Turkish icazet), the master's license to practice and teach illumination. In Saudi Arabia it is practiced in Jeddah by artists trained in these lineages abroad, notably Dana Awartani, who studied illumination with masters in Istanbul and geometry at the Prince's School of Traditional Arts in London. The Ottoman-Turkish lineage of this art is documented separately as CRAFT-2938.
Risk level: Vulnerable · The art of illumination (Təzhib / Tazhib / Zarhalkori / Tezhip / Naqqoshlik) was inscribed on the UNESCO Representative List in 2023 by Azerbaijan, Iran, Tajikistan, Türkiye and Uzbekistan; Saudi Arabia is not a party to that inscription.
The painting of bold geometric and floral murals directly onto interior walls by women of the Asir region, southwestern Saudi Arabia, inscribed by UNESCO in 2017 on the Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity.
The preparation of al-bukhoor, scented incense blocks or blends, central to Saudi Arabian hospitality and ritual life, tracing its roots to the ancient Arabian Peninsula's historic position at the crossroads of the global incense trade,…
The forging of traditional Saudi Arabian daggers, distinguished into two documented types -- al-janbiyah, a curved blade, and al-khanjar, a straight blade -- alongside the related saif, a single-edged sabre.
The roasting, grinding, spicing, and ceremonial brewing of qahwa, Saudi Arabia's traditional Arabic coffee, a preparation historically regarded as a skill worthy of respect, with a host capable of brewing a perfect cup considered a…
The hand-weaving of wool, goat hair, and camel hair into tents, furnishings, and decorative items by Bedouin women of the Arabian Peninsula, inscribed by UNESCO in 2020 as a shared element of Saudi Arabia and Kuwait's Intangible Cultural…
The hand-forming of the dallah, the iconic long-spouted Arabic coffee pot of the Arabian Peninsula, from brass, copper, silver, or, for the most valuable examples, twenty-four-carat gold, using metalworking techniques passed down across…
Lao sa paper (ກະດາດສາ kradaat sa) is the traditional handmade paper of Laos, produced from the bark of the sa tree (Broussonetia papyrifera — paper mulberry) using a technique closely related to Thai saa paper and ultimately descended from…
Hanji is the traditional Korean handmade paper produced from paper mulberry bark (dak — Broussonetia papyrifera) using a distinctive Korean technique (oebal tteugi — single-mold shaking) that produces paper of extraordinary strength and…
The making of paper from esparto grass (Stipa tenacissima) — a paper-making tradition that was Spain's primary industrial paper source from the 1850s to the 1970s before wood pulp replaced it, but which survives as an artisan paper…
A chisel-and-mallet paper-cutting technique developed in San Salvador Huixcolotla, Puebla, in which artisans stack up to fifty sheets of colored tissue paper and punch elaborate symmetrical designs through the entire stack at once,…
Jianzhi (剪紙 — 'scissor paper') is the Chinese paper-cutting tradition maintained in Taiwan by Hokkien and Hakka communities — a tradition brought from Fujian Province and adapted to Taiwanese Buddhist, Taoist, and folk religious contexts.
The design and hand-fabrication of contemporary jewelry from corrugated cardboard and paper straws by Austrian artist Monica Peksa, part of the same wider international coiled/compressed cardboard jewelry movement documented in Italy,…