Tugrul is a PhD candidate in Harvard University’s joint program in the Middle Eastern Studies and History of Art and Architecture since 2018. His work focuses on Islamic art and architecture during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. His dissertation project tentatively titled, “The Shrine of Rumi and Mevlevi Socioreligious Spaces in Anatolia, (1270-1506)” will investigate the networks of patronage, pilgrimage practices to Sufi shrines, and their phenomenological dimensions. Tugrul holds a B.A. in history from Bogazici University, and an M.A. in art history from the University of Texas, Austin. Among his interests are Islamic aesthetic perceptions of marble and spolia materials and the sociocultural agency of Sufi complexes and madrasas in late medieval Anatolia and early Ottoman world.