Mouneer al-Sha'rani
1952– · Salamiyah
Mouneer al-Sha'rani was born in Salamiyah, Syria, on 6 September 1952, and grew up in Homs and Damascus. From the age of ten he studied calligraphy with Muhammad Badawi al-Dirani, the master of the Damascus school, and in 1977 he graduated in graphic design from the Faculty of Fine Arts at Damascus University. Political trouble led him to leave Syria in the early 1980s, and he lived and worked in Cairo from 1985 to 2007 before returning to Damascus. Grounded in the classical scripts, he has revived neglected forms such as Kairouan and square Kufic and Maghribi, and has designed new letter shapes, typefaces, logos and hundreds of book covers. He chooses his texts from Sufi poets, philosophers and Christian as well as Islamic sources, or writes his own, and he argues that calligraphy is an art of a civilisation rather than of a religion. His work was shown at the Rietberg Museum in Zurich, the Sharjah Art Museum, the British Museum's 'Word into Art' in 2006 and the Sharjah Biennial in 2013, and he won the modernisation prize at the first Sharjah calligraphy biennial in 2004. A bilingual monograph on him, 'Against the Grain', appeared in 2023.
Achievements
- Studied calligraphy from the age of ten with Muhammad Badawi al-Dirani; graduated in graphic design from the Faculty of Fine Arts, Damascus University, in 1977.
- Revived neglected historical scripts such as Kairouan and square Kufic and designed new letterforms and typefaces.
- Showed at the Rietberg Museum, Zurich (1998), the Sharjah Art Museum (2001), the British Museum's 'Word into Art' (2006) and the Sharjah Biennial (2013).
- Won the modernisation prize at the first Sharjah International Calligraphy Biennial (2004).
- Published copybooks for ruq'ah, naskh, thuluth, ta'liq, diwani and Kufic (Tunis, 1988) and the book 'A Contemporary Artistic Vision of Arabic Calligraphy' (2025).
Taught by: Muhammad Badawi al-Dirani
His work
He is living, so his calligraphy is not shown; no free photograph of him was found on Wikimedia Commons.
Write in the tradition this hand shaped.
Write in this tradition now →Living calligraphers you can buy from — signed originals on paper, from AED 550: Anwar Alhulwani (Thuluth) · Ahmed Alhawary (Jali Thuluth, Naskh) · Rasha Kasim (Kufi) — or every Kufic piece the store makes: Kufic collection.
Sources
- birth 6 Sept 1952 Salamiyah, al-Dirani, Damascus 1971–77, style, exhibitions, books, Sharjah 2004 prize, leaving Syria early 1980s, return 2004 ar.wikipedia.org
- Cairo 1985–2007, scripts, British Museum Word into Art 2006, exhibitions list, 2023 monograph en.wikipedia.org
- interview (Atassi Foundation) atassifoundation.com
- 2023 monograph by AbiFarès and Samir khattbooks.com
Written by the MASHQ studio · last updated 2026-10-05. Further reading, the standard references in English: Sheila S. Blair, Islamic Calligraphy (Edinburgh University Press, 2006) · Annemarie Schimmel, Calligraphy and Islamic Culture (New York University Press, 1984) · Yasin Hamid Safadi, Islamic Calligraphy (Thames and Hudson, 1978).