CURRICULUM VITAE

CURRICULUM VITAE
Personal Information
First Name / Surname
Dr Sara Kuehn
sara@sarakuehn.com
Research Interests
Visual piety in Islamic art; devotional artefacts and religious material culture in the Turco-Iranian
world, in Anatolia and in the Balkans; ritual and religion; Islamic art objects; pre-Islamic and
medieval Islamic religious, cultural, scientific and artistic history; cross-cultural aspects of
medieval visual culture with a focus on Islamic, Eastern Christian and Jewish artistic
interactions.
Academic Career
Dates
Academic degree awarded
Principal subjects
Dissertation title
Name of institution
Dates
Academic degree awarded
Principal subjects
Thesis title
Name of institution
Dates
Academic degree awarded
1999 – 2009
Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.)
Islamic Art and Archaeology
The Image of the Dragon: Evolution of an Iconography in Central Asia and Beyond
Advisor: Prof. Dr Claus-Peter Haase
Accepted as “magna cum laude”
Department of the History of Art and Archaeology, Free University of Berlin, Berlin,
Germany
1997 – 1998
Master of Arts (M.A.)
History of Art and/or Archaeology, Islamic and Central Asian/Chinese Art and Archaeology
Sufi Brotherhoods in Anatolia and Their Iconographic Representations
Department of the History of Art and Archaeology, School of Oriental and African Studies
(SOAS), University of London, London, UK
1987 – 1991
Bachelor of Arts (B.A.)
Principal subjects
Chinese and Japanese Art and Archaeology, Department of the History of Art, Art and Cultural
History; Economics
Scholarship
1988 – 1991, Monbusho Scholarship, Japanese Government (Monbu-kagaku-shō) Scholarship
program
Name of institution
Sara Kuehn, March 2015
International Christian University (ICU), Tokyo, Japan
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Relevant professional experience
Dates
Occupation or position held
Main activities and responsibilities
1998 – present
Consultant
Evaluation of museum collections and curatorial documentation in the context of World Heritage
missions, as well as other consulting activities.

United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) – United Nations
Development Program (UNDP); regular missions in the Middle East for periods ranging from six
weeks to half a year with at least four missions per year, in particular to the Kuwait National
Museum, Dār al-Athār al-Islāmiyyah, Kuwait.

Extensive fieldwork, acquaintance with monuments and museums, research and preparation
of publications and a comprehensive photographic database on various themes related to art
and archaeology in Central Asia (Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan
and Mongolia), Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, the Caucasus (especially Armenia and Azerbaijan),
Turkey, the Middle East (especially Syria and Lebanon), the Far East (China, Japan and Korea),
and Central and Southeastern Europe (including the Crimea).
1998 – 2008
Kuwait National Museum, Dār al-Athār al-Islāmiyyah (Al-Sabāh Collection), Kuwait; the
Collection embraces over 30,000 objects of art covering the region extending from Spain to
China (with a special emphasis on Central Asia and the Iranian world), from the 7th to the l9th
century AD. Curatorial documentation of a wide range of artefacts; cataloging of a large part of
the Collection.
2009 – 2011
Museum of Applied Arts (MAK), Vienna, Austria; curatorial documentation and research of
the holdings of textiles and costumes from Central Asia, the Maghreb and the Balkans, Textiles
Department.
2011 – 2015
2011–2012: Österreichische Forschungsgemeinschaft (Austrian Research Foundation),
Vienna, Austria, grant for research and pilot study on the iconographic expressions of Sufism
in the western Balkans (Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Novi Pazar Sandžak in Serbia,
Macedonia, Kosovo and Albania) with particular focus on the Naqshbandiyya, Qādiriyya,
Rifā‘iyya, Khalwatiyya, Mawlawiyya, Malāmiyya, Sa‘diyya and Bektāshiyya brotherhoods.
2012: London Academy of Iranian Studies (LAIS), London, UK, grant for continuation of field
research, as stated above.
2012–2013: Orient Institut der Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft (OIB), Beirut,
Lebanon, Postdoctoral Research Fellow.
2013: Research grant, Iran Heritage Foundation.
2013–2014: NEC-Institute for Advanced Study, Bucharest, Romania, EURIAS/MARIE
CURIE Junior Fellow.
2015: L'institut d'études avancées d'Aix-Marseille (IMéRA), Marseille, France, Researcher.
Sara Kuehn, March 2015
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PUBLICATIONS
{published and forthcoming}
Monographs:
Forthcoming
Monsters as Bearers of Life-Giving Powers? Trans-Religious Migrations of an Ancient Western
Asian Symbolism (9th to 14th Century AD). With a Foreword by Lokesh Chandra, Indira Gandhi
National Centre for the Arts, New Delhi, to appear 2015 (c. 20,000 words with 50 full colour
illustrations).
Accepted for publication
Ancient Iconographies in Western Asia: 2500 BC to 650 AD, Reimer Verlag: Berlin, to appear
2015 (c. 200,000 words with 180 full colour and b/w illustrations).
2011
The Dragon in Medieval East Christian and Islamic Art. With a Foreword by Robert Hillenbrand,
Islamic History and Civilization: Studies and Texts 86, Brill: Leiden, Boston, June 2011 (c.
215,000 words with 200 full colour and b/w illustrations).
20th World Prize for the Book of the Year of the Islamic Republic of Iran, 2013, issued by the
Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance of the Islamic Republic of Iran.
Reviewed: The Journal of the American Oriental Society, Oct–Dec, 131, 4, 2011, p. 695;
Bulletin critique des Annales islamologiques 28, 2012, p. 118; Wiener Zeitschrift für die Kunde
des Morgenlandes 103, 2013, pp. 499–501; Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society 2014 (in press).
Journal Articles and Book Chapters:
2016
“Pilgrimage as Muslim Religious Commemoration: The Case of Ajvatovica in BosniaHerzegovina,” Muslim Pilgrimage in Europe, eds. I. Flaskerud and R.J. Natvig, Ashgate:
Ashgate Studies in Pilgrimage, ed. J. Eade, 2016.
2016
“Vestiges of the Ourobóros in the Medieval Islamic Visual Tradition,” Proceedings of the 9th
International Congress on the Archaeology of the Ancient Near East (ICAANE), Wiesbaden:
Harrassowitz, 2016.
2015
“On Beauty in the ‘Illuminist Vision’ of Suhrawardī Maqtūl,” Aesthetics of the Sublime: Religious
Texts and Rhetorical Theory, eds. S. Dorpmüller, I. Weinrich, M. Stille and J. Scholz,
Heidelberg: Springer, 2015.
2015
“Visions of the Universe in the Religious Symbol System of Third-Millennium-B.C. BactriaMargiana,” Transactions of the Margiana Archaeological Expedition: In Memory of Professor
Victor Sarianidi 6, Moscow, 2015.
In press
“The Dragon Fighter: The Influence of Zoroastrian Ideas on Judaeo-Christian and Islamic
Iconography,” ARAM Periodical (ARAM Society for Syro-Mesopotamian Studies), vol. 27,
Leuven: Peeters, 2015.
2014
“Ungeheuer als Träger lebensspendender Macht? Transreligiöse Migrationen einer alten
Symbolik im Vorderen Orient (9.–14. Jh.),” EOTHEN VI, 2014.
2014
“‘Escaping the Jaws of Death’: Some Visual Conceptualisations in Late Medieval Islamic and
Eastern Christian Art,” In Umbra: Demonology as a Semiotic System, eds. D. Antonov and O.
Khristoforova, Issue 3, Moscow: Indrik, 2014, 133–164.
2014
“The Dragon in Transcultural Skies: Its Celestial Aspect in the Medieval Islamic World,” eds. N.
Gutschow and K. Weiler, Spirits in Transcultural Skies, Transcultural Research – Heidelberg
Studies on Asia and Europe in a Global Context, eds. M. Herren, A. Michaels and R. Wagner,
Heidelberg: Springer, 2014.
In press
“The Dragon in Medieval Islamic Astrology and Its Indian and Iranian Influences,” Proceedings,
01–04 February, 2012, Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts, New Delhi, 2015.
Sara Kuehn, March 2015
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2009
“On the Role of the Ophidian and the Quadruped Dragon within the Iconography of the
Mythological Scheme of the Oxus Civilisation,” On the Track of Uncovering a Civilization. A
Volume in Honor of the 80th Anniversary of Victor Sarianidi, Transactions of the Margiana
Archaeological Expedition, vol. 3, Moscow-St. Petersburg: Aletya, November 2009, pp. 43–67.
2007
“Tilework on Funerary Monuments of the 12th to 14th Century in Konya Urgench (Gurganj),” Arts
of Asia March–April 2007, vol. 38, no. 2, pp. 1–18.
2006
“Towards the Dragon and the Mythical Bird: Tracing Possible Antecedents for Some Elements
of Khitan Iconography,” Arts of Asia September–October 2006, vol. 36, no. 5, pp. 67–88.
Exhibition Catalogues:
2014
“Engel im Islam,” Engel – himmlische Boten in alten Handschriften. Begleitbuch zur
gleichnamigen Ausstellung der Österreichischen Nationalbibliothek, Vienna, November 2014 –
Januar 2015 [Angels – Celestial Messengers in Ancient Manuscripts. Catalogue of an Exhibition
at the Austrian National Library, November 2014 – January 2015], M. Theisen, M. Diemling and
S. Kuehn, Munich, 2014, pp. 138–171.
2001
Central Asian and Islamic Textiles and Works of Art 2, London, 2001 (c. 40,000 words with 50
full colour illustrations).
2000
Central Asian and Islamic Textiles and Works of Art 1, London, 2000 (c. 30,000 words with 50
full colour illustrations).
PUBLICATIONS
{in preparation}
Monographs:
Framing Ritual Visualisation in Muslim Mysticism The Case of Southeastern Europe.
Journal Articles and Book Chapters:
“The Angels and the Prophet Muhammad: An Iconographic Interplay in Mongol Iran,” The Visual
World of Persianate Culture, ed. Y. Kadoi, Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2016.
“Hārut and Mārut: The Iconography of the Two Fallen Angels in Islamic Visual Tradition,”
Comparative Medieval Angelology Volume, ed. J.-A. Greeley, Turnhout: Brepols, 2016.
“Animals as Agents of Symbolic Metamorphoses in the External (Dis)guise of the Antinomian
Dervish in Pre-Modern Visual Culture.”
“Symbolic Characteristics of the Practice of Spiritual Retreat (Khalwa) in the Teachings of
Sayyid Yaḥyā al-Shirwānī al-Bākūbī and His Spiritual Lineage.”
“’A Veiled Tradition’: The Spirit of the Bosnian Badžijanije in the Context of their Sufi Sisters of
the Turco-Iranian World.”
“Oneiric Horizons and Cross-Cultural Convergence? Ṣarī Ṣaltūq Once More.”
“The Tekke Complex of Isa-beg Ishaković in Bembaša, Sarajevo: Tracing the Spiritual Heritage
of the First Sufi Institution of the Western Balkans.”
(with Layla al-Musawi) “Traces of the Asrār al-tawḥīd on the Architectural Decoration of the
Mausoleum of the Great Shaykh Abū Sa‛īd ibn Abī 'l-Khair Maihanī in Northern Khurasan.”
Sara Kuehn, March 2015
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Select Public Lectures and
Conference Presentations
2015 (Feb.)
“Twelver Shīʿī Components in Contemporary Bektashi Visual Piety in the Western Balkans?: A
Note on Bektashi Visual Culture,” Institute of Iranian Studies, Eötvös Loránd University, 12
February 2015, Budapest, Hungary.
2015 (Jan.)
“The Iconography of Cosmic Rulership in the Medieval Islamic World,” Insignes et lieux de
pouvoir, Histoire et archéologie de l’Islam et de la Méditerranée médiévale, Institut de recherche
sur Byzance, l’Islam et la Méditerranée au Moyen Âge (IRBIMMA), Sorbonne, 14 January 2015,
Paris, France.
2014 (Oct.)
“‘Ganymede and the Eagle’: Variations of an Airborne Theme in the Iranian World?,” The Visual
World of Persianate Culture, University of Edinburgh, 24–26 October 2014, Edinburgh, UK.
2014 (Sep.)
“On the Iconographic Theme and the Cross-Cultural Diffusion of the ‘Sēnmurv’,” The 1st
Conference of the European Association for Asian Art and Archaeology, Palacký University
Olomouc, 25–27 September 2014, Olomouc, Czech Republic.
2014 (June)
“The Heterodox Hero and Mystic Saint Ṣarī Ṣaltūq Dede: The Multiple Identities of the Most
Popular of all the Heroes amongst the Muslim Population in the Balkans,” Multiple Identities,
Population in the Balkans,” Multiple Identities, Staged Ethnicity, summer school of the University
of Fribourg, Department of Anthropology, University of Bucharest, 22 June 2014, Bucharest,
Romania.
2014 (June)
“Vestiges of the Ourobóros in the Medieval Islamic Visual Tradition,” 9th International Congress
on the Archaeology of the Ancient Near East (ICAANE), University of Basel, 09–13 June, 2014,
Basel, Switzerland.
2014 (May)
“Iconographic Expressions of Muslim Mysticism: The Case of the Western Balkans,” NECInstitute for Advanced Study, 21 May 2014, Bucharest, Romania.
2014 (May)
“The Interplay of the Angels and the Prophet Muḥammad in the Earliest Images of the Prophet
in Islamic Art,” 49th International Congress on Medieval Studies, Medieval Institute, College of
Arts and Sciences, Western Michigan University, 08–11 May 2014, Kalamazoo, MI, USA.
2014 (Apr.)
“Towards a Multidimensional Reading of Some Symbols and Imageries Employed by PresentDay Mystical Confraternities in the Western Balkans,” Annual Meeting of EURIAS Fellows,
Helsinki Collegium for Advanced Studies, 25–26 April 2014, Helsinki, Finland.
2014 (Mar.)
“The Dragon Fighter in Eastern Christian & Islamic Art,” American University of Beirut (AUB),
Archaeological Museum, 26 March 2014, Beirut, Lebanon.
2013 (Feb.)
“Aspects of the Imagery of the Itinerant Antinomian Dervish: Reflections in 16th- and 17thCentury Mughal Miniatures in the Context of Indo-Iranian Traditions,” Historical & Cultural (IndoPersian) Relations of India, Iran and Central Asia: Centuries of Continuity, Department of
Persian, Gauhati University, 06–08 February 2014, Guwahati, Assam, India.
2013 (Feb.)
“Monsters as Bearers of Life-Giving Powers? Trans-Religious Migrations of an Ancient Western
Asian Symbolism (9th to 14th Century AD),” Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts, 04
February 2014, New Delhi, India.
2013 (Dec.)
“Animals as Agents of Symbolic Metamorphoses in the External (Dis)guise of the Antinomian
Dervish in Pre-Modern Visual Culture,” Le bestiaire des prophètes et des saints de l’Islam,
workshop organized by CNRS, GSRL and CETOBAC, 06 December 2013, Paris, France.
2013 (Nov.)
(with Mehmet Tütüncü) “Balkanlarda Yaşayan Sarı Saltuk: Günümüzde Sarı Saltuk’un Balkan
Ülkelerindeki önemi ve algısı üzerine,” Balkanlara Gidişinin 750. Yılında: Uluslararası Sarı
Saltuk Gazi Sempozyumu organised by T.C. Trakya Üniversitesi and Tika T.C. Başbakanlik, 6–
10 November 2013, Constanta, Romania.
Sara Kuehn, March 2015
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2013 (Oct.)
“Further Notes on the Setting for the Veneration of Ṣarī Ṣaltūq Dede,” Scientific Readings in the
Memory of Usein Bodaninskiy in Bakchisaray, Crimea, Ukraine, CRI “Bakhchisaray Historical
and Cultural Preserve” and the Institute of Archaeology of the Ukraine (NAS), 23–27 October
2013, Bakhchisaray, Crimea, Ukraine.
2013 (Oct.)
“Pilgrimage as Muslim Religious Commemoration: The Case of Ajvatovica in BosniaHerzegovina,” Muslim Pilgrimage in Europe, University of Bergen, Centre for Middle East and
Islamic Studies, Department of Archaeology, History, Cultural Studies and Religion, 03–04
October 2013, Bergen, Norway.
2013 (Sept.)
“Contemporary Bektashi Visual Piety in the Western Balkans,” Sixth Biennial Convention of the
Association for the Study of Persianate Societies (ASPS), 02–06 September 2013, Bosniak
Institute (Bošnjački Institut), Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina.
2013 (July)
“Symbolic Characteristics of the Practice of Spiritual Retreat (Khalwa) in the Teachings of
Sayyid Yaḥyā al-Shirwānī al-Bākūbī and His Spiritual Lineage,” Proceedings in Celebration of
the 550th Anniversary of the Birth of Seyyid Yahya Bakuvi, National Academy of Sciences
Republic of Azerbaijan, 02–03 July 2013, Baku, Azerbaijan.
2013 (Feb.)
“Ungeheuer als Träger lebensspendender Macht? Transreligiöse Migrationen einer alten
Symbolik im Vorderen Orient (9.–14. Jh.),” Institute of Art History, University of Vienna, 19
February 2013, Vienna, Austria.
2013 (Jan.)
“Escaping the “Jaws of Death”: Some Visual Conceptualisations in Late Medieval Islamic and
Eastern Christian Art,” Orient Institut der Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft (OIB), 22
January 2013, Beirut, Lebanon.
2012 (Aug.)
“The Jaws of Life or of Death in Islamic and Eastern Christian Art (10th–13th Centuries),” The
Ninth Biennial Iranian Studies Conference organised by the International Society for Iranian
Studies (ISIS) and the Iran Heritage Foundation (IHF), 01–05 August 2012, Istanbul, Turkey.
2012 (July)
“The Lupine Steppe Dragon Revisited: Its Representative Role on 3rd- to 1st-Century BC
Pastoral Paraphernalia from Rostov Province to South Central and Western Siberia,” The 55th
Annual Meeting of the Permanent International Altaistic Conference (PIAC) organised by the
PIAC and the Babeş-Bolyai University of Cluj-Napoca, 22–27 July 2012, Cluj-Napoca, Romania.
2012 (Feb.)
“The Dragon in Medieval Islamic Astrology and Its Indian and Iranian Influences,” India-Mongol
Relations – Some Unexplored Areas of Research, international seminar organised by the Indira
Gandhi National Centre For The Arts, 01–04 February 2012, New Delhi, India.
2011 (Oct.)
“Sufism (Taṣawwuf) in Bosnia and Herzegovina,” seminar at The Islamic College, Middlesex
University, Course Islamic Mysticism, London, UK.
2011 (July)
“The Dragon in Transcultural Skies: Its Celestial Aspect in the Medieval Islamic World,” Spirits in
Transcultural Skies, Cluster of Excellence “Asia and Europe in a Global Context”, University of
Heidelberg, 30 June–02 July 2011, Heidelberg, Germany.
2011 (June)
“The Iconography of the Dragon in the Central Asian World,” Postgraduate diploma class on
Islamic Central Asia, School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London,
London, UK.
2011 (June)
“Iconographic Expressions of Mythical Creatures in Islamic Art,” MA class in Islamic Art and
Archaeology, School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London, London, UK.
2011 (Mar.)
“Layers of Architectural Decoration on the Mausoleum of the Great Shaykh Abū Sa‛īd ibn Abī 'lKhair Maihanī in Northern Khurasan,” The Ancient Material Culture of Turkmenistan and Its
Place in the Development of World Civilization, State Institute of Cultural Heritage of
Turkmenistan, Central Asia and the East and the Turkmenistan Ministry of Culture, 07–08
March 2011, Ashgabat, Turkmenistan.
Sara Kuehn, March 2015
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2010 (July)
“The Makara and the Yaksha in Kushan-Period Gandhara,” The European Association of South
Asian Archaeology and Art (EASAA), University of Vienna, Department of Art History, 04–10
July 2010, Vienna, Austria.
2010 (July)
“The Dragon Fighter: The Influence of Zoroastrian Ideas on Judaeo-Christian and Islamic
Iconography,” Zoroastrianism in the Levant, ARAM Twenty Eighth International Conference,
University of Oxford, The Oriental Institute, 05–07 July 2010, Oxford, UK.
2010 (July)
“The Reliefs of the Çifte Minare Madrasa at Erzurum: Armenian Iconographical Influences?,”
Cultural and Artistic Transfer in the Christian Middle East. Beyond Byzantium: Interdisciplinary
and Transcultural Perspectives, Society for Renaissance Studies and the University of York,
15–17 July 2010, York, UK.
2009 (July)
“Towards the Devouring and Issuing Aspect of the Dragon Iconography in the Iranian World, the
Caucasus and Eastern Anatolia/Jazira from the Tenth to the Thirteenth Century: Some
Preliminary Reflections,” The Turkic World, the Caucasus and Iran – Crossroads of Civilizational
Interaction, Iran and the Caucasus, Brill, Leiden, and the Institute of Archaeology and
Ethnography, National Academy of Sciences, RA, 10–12 July 2009, Yerevan, Armenia.
2008 (Oct.)
“Towards the Serpent-Dragon Iconography in the Bactria-Margiana Archaeological Complex,”
The Turkmen Land as a Centre of Ancient Cultures and Civilizations, State Institute of Cultural
Heritage of Turkmenistan, Central Asia and the East and the Turkmenistan Ministry of Culture,
01–03 October 2008, Ashgabat, Turkmenistan.
2006 (May)
“Tilework on 12th- to 14th-Century Funerary Monuments in Urgench (Gurganj),” Kunya Urgench:
Resources and Partnerships for Preservation and Conservation of World Heritage in Central
Asia, The Turkmenistan National Commission for UNESCO, the State Institute of Cultural
Heritage of Turkmenistan, Central Asia and the East and the Turkmenistan Ministry of Culture in
Ashgabat and Kunya Urgench (World Heritage site), 01–03 May 2006, Ashgabat, Turkmenistan.
Conference Organisation
2015 (June)
Conference convener together with Dionigi Albera and Manoël Pénicaud, Lieux saints en
Méditerranée. Entre partage et partition, Musée des Civilisations de l'Europe et de la
Méditerranée (MuCEM), Marseille, France, 03–05 June 2015.
2015 (July)
Conference convener together with Hans-Peter Pökel, Angels and Mankind: Nature, Role and
Function of Celestial Beings in Near Eastern and Islamic Traditions, Orient-Institut Beirut (OIB),
Beirut, Lebanon, 02–04 July 2015.
Sara Kuehn, March 2015
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