Victoria Holbrook
Fellow, Society of Fellows, SOF/Heyman, Columbia University (1985–1987)
Lecturer, Architecture, Istanbul Bilgi University
Fellow, Society of Fellows, SOF/Heyman, Columbia University (1985–1987)
Lecturer, Architecture, Istanbul Bilgi University
Victoria Rowe Holbrook has been teaching philosophy in the Faculty of Architecture at Istanbul Bilgi University since 2009. She teaches courses such as "Architecture and Philosophy" and "Self and Space." She translates and writes. Recent translations include: O Humankind: Yā-Sīn by Cemalnur Sargut (Louisville: Fons Vitae 2021), a Turkish compilation of commentaries on chapter 36 of the Quran; Listen: Commentary on the Spiritual Couplets of Mevlana Rumi by Kenan Rifai (also Fons Vitae, 2011), Turkish prose commentary and Persian verse; The New Cultural Climate in Turkey: Living in a Shop Window by Nurdan Gürbilek (London: Zed 2010), Turkish essays in cultural and literary criticism. Two recent articles of hers on relationships between Ancient Greek and Islamic philosophy are: “Metaphysics of Beauty in Islam,” Studia Philosophica Wratislaviensia vol. XVII, fasc. 1, 45-51.(2022) and “Plato, Fetters Round the neck, and the Quran,” Studia Philosophica Wratislaviensi, vol. XVI, fasc. 4, 27-45 (2021).
A recent piece of art criticism is her “Being with a Painter,” in The Living Thing About a Painting, a catalog for a painting exhibition by Jill Bullitt (Istanbul: Kiraathane Edebiyat Evi 2022). She is now working on relationships between Islamic philosophy and German Idealism.