Susan Scollay

Dr Susan Scollay is an honorary principal fellow in Art History and Curatorship, School of Culture and Communication, University of Melbourne. As an independent scholar on three continents, she has published, curated exhibitions and carried out extensive fieldwork in historic textiles; in Islamic architecture and decorative objects, especially those of the Ottoman empire; and in the Persianate arts of the book — as well as in the connections between all these fields and their parallels in early modern Europe.  Susan’s current project is a monograph on the history of the Ottoman imperial palace at Edirne/Adrianople, begun in 1451 and ruined in 1877. Additional projects include a survey of European travellers to the Ottoman empire in the early modern era and research into the reception and collecting of Persianate material culture in early modern Europe and in Australasia from the nineteenth century.  In 2013, Susan was elected as a fellow of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland and she is a long-standing contributing editor of the prestigious London journal, HALI: Carpet, Textile and Islamic Art. 

Profile image: Detail - embroidered cover for bow and arrows, Ottoman Turkey, early seventeenth century, gold- and silver-covered thread laid-and-couched on silk velvet covering leather base. Collection of the Museum of Applied Arts, Budapest, Hungary. Photo: Susan Scollay.