Illumination or Miniature? Their Differences and Meeting Point

Short answer: Tezhip (illumination) is an art of ornament; the miniature is an art of painting (depiction). Both use gold and natural pigment, and often meet on the same page. What is illumination? From 'zeheb' (gold). It adorns the margins and headings (serlevha) of a text, a Qur'an or a panel with gold and colour. Its motifs are abstract: rumi, hatayi, semse, cloud. What is the miniature? A painting that depicts an event, place or scene at small scale. Meaning precedes perspective; the important figure is drawn large, the distant one placed higher. Where do they meet? In a classical manuscript the miniature tells the scene, while illumination frames it and adorns the page. One is 'what is told', the other 'how it is adorned'. At Arakiye the Miniature and Tilework & Illumination collections carry on these two traditions separately; each work is made one of a kind with natural pigment and genuine gold.