Nassar Mansour

Born Amman, Jordan, 1967

Mansour obtained a BA in jurisprudence and legislation (Islamic studies), economics and statistics from the University of Jordan, 1988. He later graduated with an MA in Islamic arts, specializing in Arabic calligraphy, from the Al al-Bait University, Jordan, 1997. He was a lecturer in the art of Arabic calligraphy at the University of Jordan, 1991–5, and later at the Faculty of Traditional Islamic Arts, al-Balqa’Applied University, Jordan, 1998–9. Between 1997 and 1999 he was in charge of calligraphy and ornamentation on the project of rebuilding the twelfth-century Saladin’s pulpit (minbar), destroyed in 1969, at the al-Aqsa Mosque, Jerusalem. In 2003 Mansour received a calligraphy diploma (ijaza) from renowned Turkish master calligrapher Hasan Çelebi (b. 1937). In 2007 he was awarded a PhD in the art of Arabic calligraphy (muhaqqaq script) from the University of Wales Prince's School of Traditional Arts, London. He has participated in numerous calligraphy workshops and exhibitions in the Middle East, Europe, India, Malaysia and Japan. His work includes publications on calligraphy and the ijaza. In 2005, with Venetia Porter, he organized an exhibition on the ijaza, The Making of the Master, at the British Museum.