Islamic Influences on American Architecture « Al Mihrab: The Place of War

The Louvre’s New Islamic Galleries Bring Riches to Light – NYTimes.com. Now the museum is again risking the public’s wrath as it introduces the most radical architectural intervention since the pyramid in 1989. Designed to house new galleries for Islamic art, it consists of ground- and lower-ground-level interior spaces topped by a golden, undulating roof that seems to float within the neo-Classical Visconti Courtyard in the middle of the Louvre’s south wing, right below the museum’s most popular galleries, where the Mona Lisa and Veronese’s “Wedding Feast of Cana” are hung.

Profile of 'Dirty Paki Lingerie' Playwright – WSJ.com. As a playwright, Aizzah Fatima knows she is pushing boundaries with the title of her one-woman show, "Dirty Paki Lingerie," which will make its debut Saturday at the Dorothy Strelsin Theatre as part of the Midtown International Theatre Festival. But as an actress, Ms. Fatima is delighted to portray roles that transcend the traditional fare she is typically offered as a Pakistani Muslim actress. "'Terrorist No. 2's girlfriend' is an actual title of a character I once auditioned for," she said.

God rest his soul. One of the great minds of the field. Oleg Grabar, Historian of Islamic Art, Dies at 81 – NYTimes.com. Oleg Grabar, a historian of Islamic art and architecture whose imposingly broad range and analytical subtlety helped transform the Western study of Islamic culture, died Saturday at his home in Princeton, N.J. He was 81.