Srinagar, Sept. 11 -- The designs on the walls of the Alhambra in Spain to the Selimiye Mosque in Konya or, closer home, the Khanqah-e-Moula are visual evidence of the infinite design opportunities that are contained in simple geometric forms, made possible with elementary tools.

By Shubhanjana Das

IF you can wrest your eyes away from the harlequin colours of the intricate Papier-mache hand-painting on Srinagar's Khanqah-e-Moula's front deck, and look inside the halls of this venerated sanctum, your eyes will be enraptured by intricately carved khatamband hand-painted in jewel tones.

Besides being one of the oldest mosques in Kashmir, Khanqah-e-Moula is a study into Islamic design and its radical experiment in geometry and form practic...