There were lots of interesting points throughout this semester, but one lecture in particular really caught my attention. That lecture was on Islamic architecture and it was the technology, sacred geometry and pendentives that really caught my attention. Previous to this semester, I had no idea how advanced the Islamic civilization was during such a dark time in world history. For a culture to actually rise up in the dark ages and contribute in the world of architecture, writings, and religion. One of the more amazing things to me was they weren't just contributing to these ideas but preserving them by collecting all the writing they could so they wouldn't be lost forever. On top of the rising of the culture, the actual pendentive construction the Islamic tradition invented I found quite fascinating. This idea can really be seen in the Hagia Sophia with its different pendentives throughout the building. The multiple banding of the arches makes up a part of Islamic sacred geometry that I can really appreciate. I find myself getting lost in the overlapping shapes and it seems to take my brain away from the physical world and lets me relax my mind. It is these few ideas and a couple more that really made the Islamic lecture, specially the Hagia Sophia, the most interesting, and I definitely see myself looking a bit more into the Islamic past for ideas with geometry and arches for my future project.
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