Rereading the Works of Hadi Tajvidi Based on Gadamer’s Philosophical Hermeneutics

In the contemporary era, many painters have attempted to revive the Iranian identity and release Iranian miniatures from the influence of the West on this art. Hadi Tajvidi is one of the most prominent painters who tried in this field. After several centuries of hiatus in Iranian miniature, he started to renew this art. He also founded the Tehran School of Miniature by using the characteristics of authentic and traditional Iranian art. The most prominent feature of Tajvidi’s works is adding perspective to the miniature and creating bright shadows in the facial parts. This resulted in a realistic evolution of face painting in Iran. Moreover, the face coloring in his works is uniquely modern Iranian, setting them apart from those of other artists. Many contemporary painters have clearly drawn influence from Master Tajevidi’s style in their works. This research studies Tajvidi’s works based on Gadamer’s philosophical hermeneutic point of view, which explores the questions of what, how, and the criteria for understanding cultural phenomena to read the works of this artist in a descriptive-analytical way. Hermeneutics is a science that deals with the process of understanding a work and examines how to receive meaning from various phenomena of existence, including speech, writing, and works of art. From Gadamer’s point of view, hermeneutics is to understand the issues that happened in the tradition, which covers a wide range and includes all the phenomena that do not have a linguistic nature and can be interpreted by language. In this way, in his opinion, art can also be considered a linguistic event, and the artwork can directly speak and communicate with the audience. This text explores how Hadi Tajvidi’s works align with Gadamer’s hermeneutic theories in contemporary times. The findings indicate that Tajvidi’s art resonates with Gadamer’s concepts, as he engages with the art of the past, dialogues with it, and integrates it with the contemporary semantic horizon. This interaction has resulted in a revival of authentic Iranian miniatures and a renewed focus on Iranian identity and culture.