islamic art postcard

Islamic decoration makes great use of geometric patterns which have developed over the centuries. Many of these derived from various earlier cultures: Greek, Roman, Byzantine, Central Asian, and Persian.They are usually distinguished from the arabesque, the term for decoration in Islamic art based on curving and branching vegetal forms. But sometimes foliage and linear geometric patterns are combined in a single design, and some purely abstract linear patterns adopt designs that seem clearly derived from vegetal arabesque ones. The geometric designs have evolved into beautiful and highly complex patterns, still used in many modern day settings.