The Rupture of ‘Iranian Handicrafts’ from ‘Fine Arts’ in Qajar’s Royal Discourse with an Emphasis on the Binary Opposition of ‘Fine Arts vs. Applied Arts’

This article uses a discourse analysis method in the Qajar discourse atmosphere, including several discourses, to identify how ‘Iranian handicrafts’ are ruptured from fine arts in relation to Qajar’s ‘royal discourse’. This study intends to answer how ‘Iranian handicrafts’ has become distinct from ‘fine arts’ and, consequently, inferior. This article has deployed method of discourse analysis from Michel Foucault’s perspective. Discourse analysis, unlike previous art historiography, does not seek to analyze continuous trends in art history. On the contrary, by rejecting historical continuity, it looks for ruptures and changes. In this method, all forms of dialogues and texts surrounding the subject are included as well as the ways texts are produced and narrated; besides, the related procedures and institutions as well as the construction of subjects are considered. The findings showed that the concept of ‘Iranian handicrafts’ in the Qajar era was constructed in a discursive atmosphere- consisting of royal discourses, modernism, Shi’ism, archaism, national identity, and constitutionalism, and so on- within dualities, the most prominent of which was ‘fine arts/ applied arts’. During this period, with Iran’s confrontation with the West and western industries, the subjects of the royal discourse (including the king, ministers, and the court) made some decisions in the fields of culture and economics which approximated the western type. Most of these decisions were directly related to handicrafts. Practical actions in these fields can be seen in Mohammad Shah's order to Abdullah Khan Memar, in the establishment of Dar al-Funoun and the school of Sanaya’ Mustazarfa as well as in the dispatching of art students to the West to promote fine arts in Iran. The consequences of such change in attitudes have been the sublimation of fine arts and the marginalization of Iranian handicrafts.