Professor Emeritus Keith Critchlow supervises the doctoral candidates at the Prince's School of Traditional Arts in London. He has been given recognition for his contribution to the understanding of Islamic geometrical art by the School of Architecture in Damascus and the School of Traditional Islamic Arts in Amman, Jordan, as well as in Egypt, Delhi and Istambul. The expansion of his work has resulted in it now being taught in Australia, in the US, and in China. Keith Critchlow is the President of the Tenemos Academy, as well as being a Fellow of the Dallas Institute. He continues to lecture on the subject internationally in his capacity as the Director of Research of the Kairos educational charity.
The manifestation of an action, object of thought (if it can be defined) necessitates a point of origin or departure in relation both to the manifestation itself and to the person who is conscious of its emergence.
From the basic circle and the hexagonal arrangement of a group of tangential circles of the same radius surrounding it emerge the three primary shapes : the triangle, the hexagon and the square.
In order to understand the mathematical basis of islamic pattern one must consider most carefully those primary moves of geometry which are all too frequently passed over lightly, or simply taken for granted.