Nina Macaraig, Koç University, Istanbul, will present her talk on Ottoman sensescapes in the Topkapı Palace where Qur’anic recitation, perfuming and aromatics constitute important aspects of Islamic material culture.

Nina Macaraig (PhD University of Minnesota, 2005) is Visiting Associate Professor in the Department of Archaeology and History of Art at Koç University, Istanbul, where she taught and conducted research between 2005 and 2017. In 2010, she was a Post-Doctoral Fellow with the Kunsthistorische Institut in Florence, Italy. After a stint as Visiting Associate Professor at Stanford University in Fall 2015, she held a Getty Fellowship in Spring 2016, for her project on “Heavenly Fragrance from Earthly Censers: Conveying the Immaterial Through the Sensory Experience of Material Objects.” In 2018, she taught courses on Islamic Architecture and Global Artistic Exchange at the University of California, Riverside.