Sponsored by Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) School of the Arts, VCUQatar, and the Qatar Foundation and organized by Sheila Blair and Jonathan Bloom, shared holders of the Hamad bin Khalifa Endowed Chair in Islamic Art at VCU, the symposia seek to explore broad issues in the visual arts of the Islamic world. In 1997 Her Highness Sheikha Mozah bint Nasser Al Missned invited the VCU School of the Arts to establish a campus in Qatar’s Education City. In recognition of VCU’s role as the founding campus of Education City, His Highness Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, the Emir of Qatar, subsequently endowed the Hamad bin Khalifa Chair in Islamic Art within VCU’s department of Art History. In doing so, he stipulated that the holders of the chair create a biennial international symposium on Islamic art, alternating between Qatar and other countries.