Computational Reading of Arabic Calligraphy

Arabic calligraphy is a wonder of the world, it combines spiritual meaning with beauty. Calligraphy is a fundamental element in many forms of Islamic art, from architecture to ornamental design. It integrates language with the language of geometry, as words and letters can be transformed to form patterns. However, reading the calligraphy can be extremely challenging because of the wide variety of fonts, and the often complex two-dimensional arrangement of the letters.


The goal of the project is to develop an artificial intelligence system to read Arabic calligraphy. The system will input Arabic calligraphy and output a reading of the text. This will necessarily involve the combination of image understanding, and natural language processing. The work is particularly challenging because of the need to integrate these different fields, and because of the two-dimensional patterns the letters and words form. However, one simplification is that the texts involved are limited.

Possible applications of this work are in art history, architecture, etc.