Dr. Gaetano Palumbo is an honorary Senior Lecturer at the Institute of Archaeology, University College London-Qatar campus.
In his lecture : “Between East and West: Qusayr ‘Amra and the representation of royal power in early Islam”, Dr. Palumbo discussed the paintings, including those recently found following an ongoing conservation intervention, in the framework of a critical analysis of iconographic elements which find their origin in the artistic expressions of Late Roman, Byzantine, and Sassanian art. It is argued that these paintings must be inscribed in a narrative of kingship and royal power.