Tatar Shamail. The World of Traditions and Today

Tatar shamail is a unique genre of fine arts among Muslims in Russia, combining a visual image with a sacred text. It is both an artistic work and a religious teaching, as well as a literary monument, making it a comprehensive representation of Tatar culture from the late 19th and early 20th centuries. At that time, Muslims were able to fully understand this intricate system of texts and images, but today, its interpretation requires the expertise of several specialists, including Orientalists, Islamic scholars, and art historians, to accurately decode its meaning.

The album contains glass and printed shamails created between the late 19th and 21st centuries, from collections of the Manuscripts and Rare Book Department at the Lobachevsky State Scientific Library of the Kazan Federal University, the Ethnographic Museum at the Kazan Federal University, the Sh. Mardjani Foundation for the Support and Development of Scientific and Cultural Programs (Moscow), as well as private collections and shamails presented by the organizers of the "Shamails of My Family: From the Past to the Present" exhibition (State Historical, Architectural, and Art Museum-Reserve Kazan Kremlin, Museum of Islamic Culture, 2015).