مجله مبانی نظری هنرهای تجسمی
سال چهارم شماره 1 (پیاپی 7، بهار و تابستان 1398)

This research aims to examine, the sociological factors affecting the new trends in Iranian painting art during 1961-1971s with the emphasis on Robert Wuthnow's viewpont. The theoretical framework used is based on the theoretical model of discursive discourse version consisting of three categories of concepts. The first set of concepts that Wuthnow poses to explain discursive changes include "environmental conditions", "context and institutional context" and "action chains." In Wuthnow's view, the concept of "environmental conditions" includes "the social, cultural, political, and economic conditions of each of the periods of cultural change." The other concept that Wuthnow emphasizes in his plot is the concept of "textures or institutional contexts." "Tissues or institutional contexts" are the most immediate conditions and production environments of the ideology in which resources are built and formulated. The institutional contexts are organizational situations and conditions in which cultural movements are produced and distributed. Schools and universities, colleges and study circles, scientific academies, newspapers, government officials and political parties are among the institutional contexts. The concept of "action chains" is the third concept that Wuthnow presents. "Action chains" occur within the context or institutional context. In the Wuthnow model, the concept of "action chains" refers to the behavior of producers and consumers of culture and the decisions of supporters of a cultural movement, censorship agents, political leaders, and others who influence the behavior of the producers of culture and audience. The second category includes "production", "selection" and "institutionalization". Wuthnow believes that by differentiating the analysis between the three processes of productions, selection, and institutionalization, we can more accurately show how social conditions affect cultural products. The "social horizon," "discursive realms," and "symbolic action," are the third of the concepts that Wesno argued for explaining discursive changes. These two conceptual categories link the general concepts of "social structure" and "art" with one another, and to a degree determine the mechanism of this relationship – influencing and influenceability. Wuthnow explains the mechanism of problem linkage with three concepts of social horizons, discourse domains and symbolic actions. In his opinion, cultural-artistic products are produced in time and place, and these two coordinates impose restrictions on the social horizon. The research hypothesis is that the discursive changes and social structure of the 1950's in Iran caused feminine tendencies in the content of the artists’ works and led to the emergence of new styles in painting. This study intends to investigate how the social structure has an impact on the new and diverse styles of painting in this era. This research, taking explanatory approach, historical interpretation method, and using historical data through the compilation of library materials, explains the ways, methods, and mechanisms through which these social conditions, has made possible the innovation and artistic tendency in this time span. The results of the research indicated that artistic movements are always related to their social environment. Social, political, and economic resources are driving forces for the production of culture, thought and art. In this research, through studying the macro-social units within the time spans considered as resources of mobilization for the creation of art, the causes of this effect has been elaborated upon and as an example of the production of culture and art, the emergence of various tendencies in painting styles of Iran in the 60s and 70s has been discussed. The claims and arguments which the study has tried to validate or invalidate its claims and arguments through examining the experimental data, was that the process of modernization and reform helped eliminate institutional barriers to artistic change in three ways: 1-  Development of the economy, increase in the number of the educated middle class, expansion of urbanization, promotion of urban lifestyle eliminates the institutional barriers against the production of culture and art, and provides a suitable social atmosphere for the development of art. 2- Government policies provide the appropriate context for the expansion of the range of dialogues and cultural interactions. In this ambience, artists can create their novel artwork. 3-The requirements of the process of development and modernization, in particular the need to satisfy the European countries to invest in Iran, paying serious attention to modernization and the so-called modernization as well as and the opening up of the cultural ambience of Iran resulted in a change in cultural policies which provided an opportunity for the expression of new thoughts and ideas in the field of art. Cultural outcomes, the requirements of the process of modernization such as the development of education, the expansion of the press, mass media and cultural movements were among the most important factors in shaping the cultural aspects of the society and providing the necessary cultural resources for the production of culture and art. Undoubtedly, the process of social change provided the necessary ground for the emergence of painting movements. However, the way in which the painters worked for the creation of works has its own logic. Therefore, it can be claimed that the nature of the themes reflected in the works of art, the characterization of the artwork and the patterns of dialogue presented therein follow the nature of the discourse text in which the artwork is produced.

Hyper-realism painting depicts an extremely realistic image of the details of the world which through the depiction of abundance presents a different view of the world reality. This style of painting is related to the reality of today's human life and since everything in the picture is based on plurality, it adds to accuracy in art. Probably upon the elimination of that part of reality which should have been the main focus, the reality itself will be eliminated. However, the recent technological advances have provided so many tools for more and more exploration of the world and expression of viewpoints in this regard that has never been possible before. Today, the human world is filled with details and via general twisting of the fundamental question; it presents a part of the challenge of authentic reality. The present study tries to conceptualize the idea of hyper-reality, posed as abundance of reality, in hyperrealism painting. This state of hyper-reality is characterized by Baudrillard's definition. Jean Baudrillard is a sociologist and a serious critic of contemporary society, who believes that the tradition of classical theory and the era of modernity have come to an end, and that the main focus should be upon the requirements of this era, i.e. postmodern. Given that in the modern society, the subject is intimately connected with reality and its representation, in the postmodern society the subject loses its connection with the real. Baudrillard uses his own simulation theory for this span of time. Based on this concept, we have entered a globalized world in which the subject has been lost and is not associated with the real thing he calls 'hyper-realism'. According to Baudrillard, Borges presented one of the first parables of the theory of hyperrealism. In one of his stories, an obsessive geographer tries to draw a map of actual, real scale, and when the empire collapsed, the map was only thing that remained. Here we see a representation of reality without an original referent because the map represents a realm that no longer exists. In this story, a representation with an abundance of details similar to reality replaces the reality that it represents, which is no longer in existence. The accumulation of details in hyper-realistic paintings is somewhat comparable to this example, which is a demonstration of an acute state of reality. To clarify this analogy, we will try to look at similar features of visual representations through the concept of simulation, which is a specific state of the representation of truth in Baudrillard's view. Hence, the search for the point of collision between the representation of truth in hyperrealism painting and the hyper-reality world becomes important. The theoretical framework of the study is based on a comparison between the representation of reality and the reality itself in the visual world of hyperrealism with that of the world of hyper-reality in accordance with the third order of Baudrillard named simulation, which has periodic divisions in Baudrillard’s view. This study employs historical-analytical method of research to provide a historical overview of the developmental stages of hyper-realistic painting beginning with visual representations, and compares them with Baudrillard's three historical periods (pre-modern, modern, post-modern) in order to find an answer to the pivotal question of the article: is there a similarity between hyper-real expressions of hyper-realistic painting and the hyper-reality world? There are also other questions to consider such as how does the state of the contemporary realism compare to the Baudrillard historical instructions? In order to find answers to the main question of this study, the formation of the required reality will be discussed in two contexts and its occurrence in different periods of time. The study hypothesis is based on the existence of commonality between hyper-realistic paintings and the hyperreal world, and the resulting situation that after the representation of truth coinciding with itself makes the recognition of the subject difficult. It could be estimated that the fading of the boundaries of reality and its representation in this way questions the existence of the subject itself. Employing descriptive-analytical method of research, the study presents a historical perspective of the periods of representation's development in realist to hyperrealism painting and its relation to the hyperreality world is investigated. Works cited and necessary information to complete this study was obtained through available library resources, scholarly papers and relevant theoretical studies made in the field. This research deals with its topic in three sections. First and foremost, it contains an introduction describing the style of hyperrealism in painting, which attempts to draw the relation between this type of representation and reality. Next, the description of the hyper-real world is studied via employing the outlines of Baudrillard's three orders. In the final section, the question of visual representation of a historical process is proposed and the relation between the representation and reality in different eras has been described which makes the comparison of hyper-realistic paintings to the characteristics of the simulation possible. The findings of this study point to the progressive degradation of the subject and the object's independence in a world the basis of which is the object and not the subject. Through confirming the similarities, the final conclusion illustrates that the hyperrealism representation complies with the extreme reflection of the truth (hyperrealism) in the postmodern era.

The prevailing forms of expression indicate that the method of expression in the Iranian modernist art, particularly painting, has deviated from its original and traditional formats; consequently, comprehending meaning in painting schools is no longer easy. Although in some motifs, symbolic elements and narratives, still traces of return to mainstream original Iranian culture might be found; however, the tendency to use the contemporary techniques of expression in painting prevents explicit disclosure of meaning and adds to its far-reaching, hidden meaning. Hanibal Alkhas is one of those Iranian modernist painters, in whose works one could find evidences of the aforesaid concept because the implicit meaning of his works dominates their explicit meaning. Among all Alkhas's works, his 'Getting Past the Tradition' painting has been selected to be reviewed using narrative codes of Barthes because as compared to works of other modernist painters, this painting has distinct elements such as being diptych, applying motifs and specifically Mesopotamia and Iranian figures. In this research, efforts have been made to reproduce the implicit meanings on one hand, and then find answer to this question that how narrative codes arising from a written text could be applied to reading painting as a visual text on the other. The narrative codes have been derived from analyzing French story of Sarrasine written by Honore de Balzac (1799-1850) which was proposed by Roland Barthes in 1970. Through contrasting distinctions that Barthes made between the artistic work and the text, one could take any work of art as a text and thus apply Barthes Narrative Code theory for the analysis of any text possessing an expression (narrative) aspect. Barthes’ interpretation of meaning and the application of significance for the analysis of the text is practically based on this viewpoint that we consider the text as a processing procedure, meaning that the respondent is also involved in the processing or reproduction of the text. However, Roland Barthes's narrative codes approach deems that first the production of meaning, as the purpose of narrative codes, is discussed. Then each of the five different kinds of semiotic elements that are common to all texts (Hermeneutic, Proairetic, Semantic, Symbolic, and Cultural) are defined separately and their features presented to determine the codes to be studied. Finally, the meanings related to each field of narrative codes are reproduced, not extracted. This paper attempts to attain concepts such as violation of accepted norms, evolution and perfection, purity and overcoming evil, getting over the past and accepting the present, and finally doubt in dogmatic narrations. To this purpose, it takes into account the visual-expressive equivalents in the field of visual arts such as the principles of proximity, rhythm, symbol, time classification based on formal elements and meta-text references (respectively). Analysis of the painting 'Getting Past the Tradition' using Roland Barthes’ narrative code theory has led to the development of semantic, evolutionary, semiotic, comparative, and meta-textual meanings. Based on formal figures of "proximity" and "direction" as visual equivalents, the hermeneutical codes recreate concepts of moving anticlockwise and violation of norms. Through visual equivalents such as rhythmic (pairing) signs, the Proairetic code has recreated meanings such as passage of time in the present moment, development and thus evolution. Some of the meanings, produced by symbolic codes and derived from semiotic equivalents such as colors as well as geometric and figurative shapes include: danger, purity and dynamism, conquering evil and liberation. Through visual comparison of past and present, semantic codes present the concept of leaving behind the past, as the source of tradition (not development within in a particular span of time). Finally, cultural codes used the tale of Siavash passing through fire mentioned in Shahnameh, in the painting 'getting passed the tradition' to recreate the concept of 'doubt' in narratives.

Scientific research has revealed that creativity is a skill that can be both acquired and taught. Moreover, most studies have indicated that organizing creative thinking training courses positively affect the students' creativity in different stages of their academic endeavors. In order to understand an artist's condition, we should take a look at the impact that social conditions leave both on him and his art. It is through examining such elements and their indisputable impact that we can discover the nature of art and the artist. Creativity is not to occur suddenly, but is a phenomenon encompassing many factors for its development and flourishing. It is a collection of talents, contemplations, acquisitions, functions and also the outcome of his works that make someone a creative artist. It might be stated that “education is indeed effective in the recognition, training and directing the emotional and mental powers. Thus, education will be inhibiting and directing; but it is not itself a producer of creative force, and consequently, it is impossible to eliminate the deficiency or lack of emotional force through education. The question of the relation of education to artistic creativity is a longstanding argument which questions the philosophy of the existence of art faculties. Although today we are witnessing lots of creative works by students, yet one of the disadvantages and traumas of modern painting is that the artist's creativity has decreased significantly and thus, the works of art are unable to communicate effectually with the human beings' creative spirit. The current paper aims to alter this schema and emphasize the educational aspect of creativity. Conducting this research deemed necessary since it attempts to clarify the appraisal and impact of training creativity. Moreover, this study should have been made to evaluate and finally identify more creative artists and reach out for them on one hand and provide proper opportunities for them on the other. The criteria for the assessment of creative art should be specified based on creativity components. Furthermore, the circumstances in which the creative researcher or creative student is working should be noted. Next, the extent of motivation of creative processes needs to be recognized: what motivates people to have creative artistic outputs and what obstructs creative thinking? To what extent the creativity-based art teaching methods affect the development of creativity in undergraduate students of painting discipline? What impact does creativity-based art education have on the accomplishment of practical projects of undergraduate painting students? Since there are limited theoretical, research material on the subject of the assessment of creativity and training, particularly in the field of painting, it is necessary to examine it among a group of students of the field to provide a foundation for the expansion of the concept of creativity to teaching art disciplines. Creativity is one of the main areas of research related to artistic phenomena. The studies conducted on creativity education suggest that creativity is not just an intrinsic trait; it can also emerge as a result of education. Many scholars of the field have mentioned creativity education, considered it possible and have provided respective evidence. Aiming to assess the impact of creativity education on improving the students' creativity in the painting workshops, the present study answers these questions: To what extent a curriculum integrated with creativity affect the development of such faculty in undergraduate students? How does education integrated with creativity affect the practical projects of students? The paper has surveyed the effect of creativity training on the undergraduate students of painting discipline taking painting workshop courses at the Faculty of Arts; Alzahra University during the academic year 2012-2013 was studied. For this purpose, a number of 18 students studying at semester 6 were selected. These students received 20 hours of training on components of creativity integrated with painting workshop curriculum. Using the skills acquired, the students created works of art during the workshop. Pre-exam was taken followed by post-exam. The Kolmogorov-Smirnov test was used to examine the normal distribution of the data and paired-samples T-Test was applied. The results indicated significant, meaningful increase in the students' creativity score (P<0.001). In other words, creativity training resulted in the improvement of the students' creative faculties. Also, according to art professors' evaluation, training creativity led to meaningful growth in the emergence of components of creativity in the practical works of students in the experimental group (p<0.05). The semi-experimental research method, Abedi's creativity test and the evaluation form of Visual Arts have been used.

The social evolutions of Qajar era, specially industrial and cultural revolutions, mark the beginning of the formation of a new phenomenon in Iran's painting structure including illustrations of the lithographic books. Although, the basics of illustration in lithographic books are rooted in traditional Iranian painting, the industrial evolution in the country including the advent and popularity of lithography made up the most important technical infrastructures of the production of this new version on one hand, while communication between Iranian and European artists, on the other hand, paved the way for cultural aggregation in illustrational style of lithographic books and Iranian painting in general. The current paper intends to survey the impacts of these upheavals on illustration in lithographic books and the respective outcomes. The main topic of studies conducted for identifying the illustration in lithographic books is limited to historical accounts or visual and formalist analysis without exploring social conditions affecting their production and also there is a lack of comprehensive and systemic surveys made in this field. Therefore, there is a need to conduct independent, systematic studies which not only examine the historical background and visual features, but also fully explain the basic reasons behind the development of this new phenomenon. Examining the industrial and cultural evolution of the time seems to help come up with new findings on the unknown aspects of the illustration of lithographic books including the fact that one of the most important aspects of industrial evolution, or to be more accurate, the advent and promotion of typography, not only led to the development of new techniques and achievements in painting, but also helped promote cultural products such as books, particularly illustrated books. This kind of printed material not only gave a new life to the cognitive growth of the society, but also made the foundation for the emergence of a new and long-life Iranian painting tradition called ‘illustration of lithographic books’ by Iranian artists. In fact, typography as a media that made reproduction of artworks possible played the most influential and technical role in the development of the lithographic books during the Qajar era. In order to make a correct analysis of the process of development and also the style of illustration in lithographic books, a combination of sociological approaches such as reflection and cultural leakage theory seems appropriate as a cognitive methodology because according to reflection approach, the social evolutions of this era, specially industrial and cultural evolutions, were among the important factors affecting the change in the structure of Iranian painting with outcomes such as transition from the wealth of images used in manuscripts to the most simplified lithographic pictures and publication of illustrated books. On the other hand, according to Bastid theory, the expansion of cultural influences of one society to the other, or better said, the combination of European objective style of painting with that of the Iranian cognitive style, led to the development of the fundamentals of Iranian painting and production of works different from the past. In a closer look, various social components such as the intermediary factors left an impact on the structure of Iranian painting. However, marking the extent of the impact of different environmental factors and the range of their interactions with each other is not an easy task, because in practice, each one of them are co-dependent and have fundamental interaction with painting. Such interaction was able to influence the visual arts and in fact, paved the way for its promotion and evolution. Since the reflection theory enables us to identify these foundations to the extent that we could obtain some concrete results, significantly helping to better recognize the subject issue, a part of the theoretical foundation of the paper is dedicated to this theory. This approach is a macro-theory in art sociology which does not need any special methodology to apply and is only a general frame to prove and express that art has somehow been and is rooted in the society, and like other art sociology approaches, it is against any approach that defines art as a phenomenon superior to social and historical determinants and the product of inner evolution of the style, needless of social and historical factors, because in fact, art as the product of society, is susceptible to the society’s conditions and reflects them. Conducted using qualitative-analytical method of research, its data has been collected via library study as well as the study of visual materials. Sociology of art encompasses various theories on the concrete relationship between art and the society. However, in order to make a correct analysis of the issue, a combination of cultural leakage theory and reflection theory seems appropriate. The current study aims at proving that social evolutions of Qajar era not only mark the beginning of a new style in illustration such as lithographic books but has also led to cultural congregation in the structure of  Iranian painting resulting in outcomes such as publicizing painting and putting an end to its belonging exclusively to the elite, creating new themes with new fans, and offering a certain amount of cooperation in a technical culture leading at the end to the continuation of developmental process of Iranian painting.

In the history of Iranian painting, there has always been a significant relationship between painting and literature. The lyrics written alongside the paintings represent part of this relationship. The narrative in painting was in most cases based on verbal narration. The visual version of Luqman-the Wise's letter of advice created by Mir Emad al-Hasani dating back to the 10th or 11th centuries is one of the different illustrated versions of Iranian manuscripts in the history of Iranian miniature that forms an inter-semiotic relation of the image and the writing. Although no definite date has been recorded on this version, experts date it around the years 961-1024 AH, i.e the estimated time of Mir Emad's perfection in art. The images of this version are not signed, but based on their characteristics; they might be considered works of artists such as Reza Abbasi or Shafi Abbasi. Like many other Iranian paintings, this manuscript enjoys a combination of verbal and visual systems. The verbal system includes the text of the Letter of Advice itself while its calligraphy and the visual system encompass images, illuminations (extensive intertext illuminations and illuminated frame), tables, book binding, as well as visual and aesthetic features of the text. The first question occurring here would be: What characteristics do the two main parts of this Letter have in relation with each other? It appears that these two syntagmas and also two syntagmatic dimensions (time and place syntagmatic) are in a bilateral relationship. The most important characteristic of compound texts like this Letter of Advice is the difference in the reading of the verbal and visual systems. Although due to the aesthetic characteristics of calligraphy, the verbal features of this manuscript are reaching the limits of local syntagma. Moreover, the type of binding as well as the location of the figures create timing syntagma (This version of the manuscript has been bound in the form of an accordion, and thus a continuous text has emerged in which one can see all eight pages simultaneously). However, the main characteristic of this version is the interference of the written text and illumination which leads to the omission of some figures. It somehow causes verbal/visual systems and syntagmatic /paradigmatic dimensions to cross and establish a creative system. The question which is raised here is that how does the paradigmatic dimension work in this transcript?  Since Roland Barthes, the 20th century French philosopher, used the linguistic topics creatively in reading nonverbal or compound texts, this research attempts to study the compound structure of the Letter of Advice by describing by analyzing some of his ideas. He employed linguistic rules of syntagmatic and paradigmatic systems in analyzing nonverbal texts in which these two axes function in separated ways. For instance Barthes has been using the two axes of the language described in the "Sign-function" analysis of a restaurant menu. He also mentions some other creative systems in which some degrees of overlap, such as arrangements that cause some differences in readings, arise. In the traditional paintings of Iran, there has been separation and discontinuity between language and image. Thus, whether the language prevails over the image or the image overcomes the language. But the Letter of Advice doesn't follow the same rule. Even though its components are diverse and could not be completely combined with each other, due to having calligraphy and drawings at the same time, this manuscripts shows signs of connection. Just like any other illustration, the elements comprising the figures in this version are organized based on the syntagmatic dimension but due to the elimination of some parts, they are in fact connected with the paradigmatic dimension. The parts omitted based on paradigmatic patterns connect to the visual parts and unconsciously fill the blank in the readers' mind. Thus, the elements that formulate this illustrated version alone or separately do not fit into one of the two aspects of language and both aspects exist at the same time. Deleted and invisible sections contribute to the formation of a more dynamic relationship between the text and the audience because the mind of the audience fills the blank parts virtually. The final and consistent gestalt of the image is what is illustrated through a combination of the individual's characteristics and mind.

Miniature Painting is one of the most important Iranian artistic genres, which is closely tied with literature, and in the history of Iranian art, some literary texts have been illustrated in this manner several times. Among these, one can refer to the book 'The Conference of the Birds'. This text, also known as Mantiq al-tair, is a celebrated literary masterpiece written by poet Farid ud-Din Attar, commonly known as Attar of Nishapur, a poet of the 6th century AH / 12th century, who lived in Neyshabur and presents a mystical and preaching attitude in his works. In the late 9th / 15th century, Behzad, a painter of Herat School, illustrated some of the Mantiq al-tair’s stories, one of which was 'Son's Mourning for the Father's Demise'. This painting depicts a group of people taking a coffin to the cemetery, to bury the deceased; so the work is a scene of public mourning, and it can be referred to as a Mourning Painting. The painting is semantically and figuratively important in the history of Iranian art. The paper at hands reviews this Mourning Painting based on Greimas' semiotic square and the generalization of twofold oppositions. At the end of the twentieth century, Greimas tried to provide a clear definition of the process of producing meaning in three levels (deep, middle and surface structure). According to Greimas, the analysis of a text or a language should begin with the deep structure, i.e the abstract data level, and proceed to the surface structure, i.e. the level where meaning and objective data exist. This paper has taken a descriptive-analytical method of research and the results indicate that here: 1) the textual relations seek to express 'sadness – happiness' opposition and explicitly display the people's Islamic religion. 2) On one hand, the deep structure reveals all relationships in the entire structure and on the other; it increases the audience's accuracy. 3) Through raising constant- variable duality, the forms of human figures, animals, vegetation and objects seek to oppose the mourning tradition in the past and that time (late Timurid period). But the movement from the detail towards the whole can reveal the implicit meaning in this work of art. For example, the flag, as a component, refers to a major discourse (mourning) in a religious, cultural and social situation, and the grave refers to the class inequality as well as the abstract concepts of rich and poor. 4) Using culture-nature duality, the composite structure in the up/down direction of the painting depicts the funeral and burial traditions, while the left/right one poses material-spiritual duality. Nonetheless, through illustrating peripheral and decorative elements such as tree and birds, the center-periphery direction of the painting suggests the cancellation of inside-outside duality. 5) The structure of distance, as a symbol of time, rests on the private-public duality. 6) Finally, upward/downward movements of the colors highlight the heaven-earth duality as a symbol of magnificence and grandeur of the other world.It could be argued that the painting is interpretable through the semiotic system of producing meaning in relation to oppositions and relationships based on the semantic square function. The painting encompasses them all by means of expressing the structuralism of life-death duality. However, the artwork contains more than one sub-dualities and oppositions (such as happiness-sadness, constant-variable, nature-culture, plurality-singularity, material-spiritual, private-public and heaven-earth). The painting is remarkably powerful in attracting the viewer to the immaterial world and death, is a symbolic concept used therein that highlights the mystical aspect of the text against others (epic, for example). The most important feature of this work of art is its successful depiction of visible tangibles and helping understand some conceptual opposite dualities. By means of these dualities and associating the meaning to each one, the painting has transcended the mere representation of text and highlights the solidarity of the people with mystical beliefs in an attempt to approach a cultural-social significance.

Visual art of the Qajar era was inspired by both the new technical developments such as photography and printing as well as the tradition of Persian painting of the previous schools that had developed new visual features. Along with this visual quality, the exposure of the artists to western traditions and the popularity of modernity caused the Iranian society to experience changes in its artistic identity and thus, new types of visual features emerged. These features depict a series of particular changes which distinguish them from the dominant worldview of the Persian painting in terms of appearance. This type of visual art creates different visual forms in comparison to previous instances of Persian painting by using different designs, new techniques and tools. Illustrated manuscripts of the Qajar era are a collection of unique documents that incorporate the art and culture of this period of time and are the readings of an authentic artistic statement of aesthetic aspects and identity layers. This paper mainly aims at classifying aesthetic features prevailing in the illustrations of the lithographed manuscripts as well as recognition and retrieving of the identity layers and presenting the priority of the identities in these illustrations. Considering the features of Iranian-Islamic art as well as the Western artistic characteristics prevalent through the Qajar era painting, it could be hypothesized that due to exposure to modernism, the visual art styles of the Qajar era are different in lots of visual and technical aspects as compared to the Persian painting tradition; however, due to the presence of some aesthetic features of Iranian-Islamic art, they might be considered the continuation of the same visual tradition. Study of the visual qualities and aesthetic aspects of a selection of Qajar-era individual documents and manuscripts which are considered as original artistic statements in this essay leads to the reading of the identity layers of this era which could be found both in art and culture of this period. In all cultures and countries, the definition of the concept of identity is associated with religion, ideology, political and social relations and history. In artworks, the identity has different layers and each layer has different aspects. Such identity might be examined in a different manner for each work of art which, in its own turn, might have several layers: one of them being stronger and more obvious than the others. Nonetheless, all the hidden layers of identity leave their trace on the outward manifestation of the identity layer in the artworks. Due to the specific social and political ambience of the country, popularity of Archaism (approaches to ancient Iran periods) as well as widespread relations with the west (through business, education, politics and etc.), Qajar reign is considered as one of the important eras of Iranian art; therefore, we can find several identity layers in the artworks of this Era. This paper chiefly intends to categorize the main aesthetic features in the illustrations of the lithographed manuscripts of Qajar era and also recognize and retrieve the identity layers therein. Subsequently, the priority of the identity layers of these illustrations shall be studied.  The study makes effort to answer these questions: What are identity layers in the visual art of Qajar Era and which identity layers appeared more frequently than others in Qajar Lithographed Folklore Manuscripts? The research has been conducted using descriptive-analytical method through the desk study of library sources as well as other valid ones such as the manuscripts. The statistical population includes 7 Lithographed Folklore Manuscripts created during the Qajar Era using a selective procedure (11 pictures were selected). The analyzed results indicate that the identity layers of the artworks of this era might be categorized into four: archaic, Persian-Islamic,westernization and Islamic-Shiite. Moreover, in each type of artworks created during the Qajar Era, some layers play a more important or a special role. In this case study (Folklore Manuscripts), the first and the most important layer is westernization to be followed by Persian-Islamic. The other layers (Islamic-Shiite and archaic) are less important and thus, imperceptible.

This descriptive-analytical research, for conducting which data has been collected through library and field studies, deals with the past and present of graphic arts in Gilan during different periods of time (since the advent of printing industry  Gilan onwards). Prior to 1953, the first graphical experiences of Gilan in the publication of the country's press were being formed. In all cases, headings were simple yet rich in form. The scripts used in logotypes were Naskh, Nastaliq, Thuluth and other types of calligraphy and lead letters were also common. As for technique and type of design, they were mostly influenced by the design types popular in the capital of the country yet in some cases, they were under the influence of the neighboring countries. Occasionally logotypes were very simple as for the technique applied but in some cases, the beautiful shapes of the Iranian traditional script were used using modern and journalist ones. In some publications (for example: Kheyrolkalam newspaper in Rasht), the heading used to frequently changed in some issues which reflects the visual taste of the management of the publication. Through examining Gilan's press graphic, particularly the logotype, we find that that there are five general tendencies existted in the structure of logos. Which have been aesthetically surveyed, compared and classified as follows: 1. Written symbols derived from the Iranian traditional scripts (for example: Kherolkalam, Nasim Shomal, etc.); 2. Written logos influenced by lead letters (for example: Gilan newspaper); 3. Compound logos (for example: Nameh Nesvan Shargh newspaper in Rasht); 4. Combined logos (for example: Rah-e Khial newspaper in Anzali). 5. Free, fantasy written logos (for example: Gilan Ma newspaper).  Via reviewing the relevant evidence and documents, as well as the material presented in this article, we find that graphic design in Gilan enjoys a longer background as compared to other parts of Iran because it had more educated people. Moreover, owing to its geographical location and proximity to the European gateway and consequently, becoming a pioneer in using modern world technologies, Gilan was also pioneer in the field of graphic design. Moreover, with the study of Gilan press, in particular its logotypes, we find a part of the graphic community of the country was formed on a small scale, which progressed with the advancement of technology, and during the flourishing of the constitutional era and relishing the national popularity gained, it flourished too. But this comparison poses some differences as well. Gilan has experienced less recession in press and consequently graphic activity. Creativity and strict adherence to visual traditions – here meaning traditional scripts – are tied together. In Gilan, imported motifs – arriving with the advent of lead print devices – were used to decorate the traditional scripts but not as the main pattern. In the designing of Gilan's press logotype, five different tendencies are observable: the first one, affected by traditional scripts, comprises the highest number, which proves that Gilan designers emphasized on the maintenance of traditions and national identity. The abundant use of Thuluth, Nastaliq and Naskh scrpits – with the most amount of application among the logotypes, testify to the aforesaid claim. Another interesting point in logotypes of Gilan's press is the obsession of the newspaper managers with updating the logotypes, as well as changing tastes throughout the publishing period. These publications have witnessed frequent changes of logotypes due to such aesthetic sensitivities. Kheyrolkalam newspaper in Rasht is best example of such alterations. In general, conducting research on the press of Gilan area, as part of the cultural geography of Iran's vast territory, particularly in terms of visual activities, could shed more light on many hidden points of the solemn artistic endeavors in the field of press and publication.

Semantics is a scientific study of coherent structure for analyzing and understanding the meaning of texts and discourses which could be achieved through the study of signifiers such as slabs. This science is always looking for the hidden structural relations of meaning production in signifiers. In the meantime, artistic writing systems such as Persian typography might be considered as a text possessing visual language which in its communicative nature, is always interacting with slabs and requires analysis and interpretation. A signifier is a textual or spoken sign with the concept derived from it called 'signified'. In analyzing typography, it doesn't suffice to focus on image as a non-changing signifier but it is the study and decoding of the relationship between this signifier and others in dimensions far beyond the conventional visual aspects, particularly in a deep conceptual dimension and the resulting signified that is of significance. In other words, in the process of its own symbolic transformation and using a language based on artistic visual rules, the Persian typography possess a combination of signifiers that reveals different types of signified optionally and based on their position. On the other hand, understanding the meaning in the relationship between the signifier and the signified depending on paradigmatic and syntagmatic rules, is another key issue in Persian typography analysis. The terms paradigmatic and syntagmatic refers to achieving similarity in the display of signifiers, which leads to the emergence of different types of relationship between them and brings about novel sets of signified under the auspices of various visual methods. This research is based on the idea that, the method of presenting signs and the relations between them in works of art have so far been almost based on an objective and formal reading, limited to visual expression and graphic geometry; consequently, the elaboration upon revealing their profound and influencing conceptual aspects in the new process of artistic analysis and reading have been neglected.  Not only these aspects have a firm interactive relationship with abstract concepts, but are also of high value due to their close relation to the roots and fundamental originality of philosophical thoughts. Therefore, it seems that the possibility of semantic analysis of typographic works and related meanings depends on the mutual recognition of the relation between the signifier and signified and their classification, which gives the resulting signification a particular value as the ultimate effect the way that it creates a one unique whole emerging out of the tangible relations of its components. Therefore, the paper at than is of importance due to the need for proper understanding of the meaning in Persian typographical works which is dependent on the full recognition of written signifiers and their relationship with each other. In order to reach the desired signified, making a proper classification in the relationship between the signifier and signified deems necessary. However, the significance resulting from this coordinated relationship becomes very significant in different paradigmatic and syntagmatic approaches. The purpose of the present study is the semantic analysis of Persian typography in the relationship between the signifier and the signified using a descriptive-analytical method of research made through desk study of library resources and case studies. It also seeks to answer the question of how the relationship between the signifier and signified in Persian typography can be categorized and using which visual method the meaning can be achieved from the difference in paradigmatic and syntagmatic approaches towards the signified. The results indicated that the Persian typography possesses such visual capabilities that within the framework of its mission in media, one can derive common or distinct signified based on the arrangement of letters as image signifiers and their readings in the form of written signifier. The realization of this is possible through establishing a proper classification between the signifier and signified in terms of examining the similarities and differences between them which leads the audience to understand its meaning when dealing with it.

The era of ancient Iran comprises of the time the inception of the Mede Empire to the fall of the Sassanian Empire and the Arab conquest of Iran. The present territory of Iran is a large part of a geographical feature called ‘the Iranian Plateau’. This natural unit possesses diverse climatic and biological features that have resulted in Iran's cultural unity. Prior to the migration of the Aryans to the Iranian plateau, there were other cultures civilizations inhabiting Iran; hence, perhaps leading the Iranian society to gain a new conception of the childhood period that embraced a new definition for all sorts of children’s games.  Ethnographically viewed, culture and civilization, including customs and traditions, has left a great impact on the creation of playing dolls, particularly the handmade traditional ones. Archeological excavations conducted in Iran have so far unearthed so many antique objects including some small ones with others possessing a childish design and thus, believed to have been toys.Today toys are considered ambassadors of culture which transfer cultural components of a single society from the old to the younger generation. Thus, toys both items of culture and its conveyor. Therefore, paying due attention to their cultural influence deems important.Archaeological excavations conducted over the world’s ancient civilizations have revealed children's toys and gadgets indicating that the importance of children’s games has long been known to mankind. Archaeologists working in different parts of the Iranian plateau have discovered objects other than everyday tools which are believed to have been used as children toys.  According to Prof. Roman Ghirshman, these small objects made by artisans and craftsman of the ancient civilizations, reflect not only the social structure and the daily lives of the peoples but also the religious, private and military aspects of the corresponding ancient society. Therefore, these small figurines were created in simple forms to meet the daily needs of the population and probably, besides being used in religious ceremonies and magical endeavors, they might have also served as children's toys. The climatic characteristics of each community determined the type of materials required for toy making. Thus, it was through understanding the nuances and subtleties of objects and combining them with their beliefs and ideals that the ancient people created various toys for children to both entertain them and express the symbolic values ​​of their society.  Besides being an item of entertainment creating moments of pleasure for children and adults, sometimes toys reflect the broad ambience of the customs and beliefs of their corresponding society through their hidden rules and meanings; or are used for educational purposes, as educational tools for teaching skills and conveying knowledge. Today, people of various societies use toys as objects of education, aesthetics, health and hygiene, technology, economics, musical, entertainment, and more.The paper at hand intends to answer these very questions that how the community in ancient Iranian civilization understood and perceived the use of children's toys? What were the features of the toys of this period, and how it affected children’s training and education? This article aims to examine types of toys used in ancient Iran as well as their shapes, designs and materials.  In a macro perspective, toys must fit into the community’s values, because it is during the games that the children become familiar with such concepts​​. Toys and items of entertainment given to the children are symbols of real objects which must not only comply with the society’s culture, but should also please the child. They should strengthen and consolidate the values ​​of society and don’t contradict them, because one of the benefits of this alignment of culture and value is to provide psychological and emotional relaxation for the children. The best opportunity and method of teaching Iranian culture and educating intelligent and exceptional children for the future generation of this country is to provide toys that best suit the culture and customs of this territory. As a major element in retrieving the role of social characters and its formation, games and toys play an important role in the community. Sociologists and psychologists have emphasized the role and importance of playing in early childhood and have considered it an important factor in learning the essential techniques of life.  Observation of artworks and studying historical books of containing information for that particular era are the most important sources of this research. Other sources include using travelogues and some literary books of ancient Iran containing valuable information about the toys used in ancient Persia.   The study results indicate that most toys had simple shapes and designs and were made of bronze, clay, glass or silver. Most of these toys were used by children of upper classes. For the educational purposes ancient toys had influenced social, emotional, and physical domains with relative effects on mental and physical development of those children. This research has been conducted using a historical-analytical method through study of library materials and pictorial data.

Methodological design studies began in early 1950s. Primarily, these studies aimed at understanding design as a scientific discipline, but around 1970s, design methodology studies shifted toward recognizing design as an independent intellectual discipline. As a result of this change in research strategy, the next decades saw the emergence of a comprehensive, coherent and inclusive understanding of design in a way that this new understanding, aligned approaches and theoretical frameworks of the design studies, like a paradigm. In his noticeable book “Designerly Ways of Knowing”, Nigel Cross examines the dimensions of this paradigm and calls it “Design as a discipline”. This understanding of design is still appreciated by researchers and even today, most of design studies are guided by this paradigm; however, since the early years of this century, scattered researches have been conducted in various design areas that reflect the emergence of a new type of understanding design. However, this new understanding has not yet been analyzed and identified well enough. Hence, the purpose of this study is to identify this new paradigm and determine its theoretical framework. To this purpose, a qualitative study was conducted through gathering documents using descriptive method of research for content analysis. Primary sources as erll as those mostly cited texts available in the field of design methodology (since 1950 to date), were widely consulted, reviewed and analyzed. Content analyse phase concentrated on extracting analytical units pertaining to the theoretical framework, objectives, methods and contextual stimuli. Next, extracted contents and analytical units were classified in three categories: “Understanding design thinking”, “Understanding design problem” and “Understanding the problem solving process”. In the next phase, each of the analytical units of these groups were compared and contrasted, synchronically and diachronically. To better report on the research process, the article body first presents the literature review on design methodology and begins with describing the "science of design", with emphasis on Herbert Simon's researches made during the 1960s. Then, it presents a review of the critiques using Descartes method in the analysis of the science of design; those that led to the formation of the second generation of design methodology in the 1970s. The second generation of design methodology is based on Horst Rhyttle's viewpoints; however, in the 80's, the second generation was criticized and revised. After these reforms, the second generation of methodology achieved coherence of theory in 1990s. As mentioned earlier, in the remainder of this article, the contents of design theory as a discipline have been presented in three categories (i.e. thinking, problem, and problem solving). In the field of design thinking, the article indicates two types of contents generated in two study groups of empirical and logical studies. These contents have led to the recognition of the autonomy of design thinking. In the field of design problem, contents are focused on the concept of "wild problem". While for of problem solving, two types of contents have been identified. First and foremost, design problem solving is not a chain of regular and deterministic activities, and second, understanding the design problem requires having an initial solution. In the discussion section, the contents of the contemporary researches have been compared and contrasted with these content categories, and on this basis, some changes have been identified in each section. The result of these analyses indicates the change of assumptions on the definition of science, wicked problems, solution driven problem solving in design, and finally, it indicates the phenomenological contents in new studies. Based on these comparisons, three periods in design methodology are identifiable: 1. period of design science, 2. period of design as a discipline, and 3. the period of design as a combination of mental activities. Identification of the coordinates of this third group is the main finding of this study. According to the arguments presented in this article, studies following the paradigm of "design as an independent discipline" have been influenced by contextual and exogenous stimuli to overemphasize the autonomy of design while design methodology is free from those intentions, nowadays. More importantly, at the present time, using new findings in conducting research studies in design thinking, design problem and design problem-solving process; there is a new understanding of design: an understanding that considers design not as a closed system or an independent mental action, but a combination of mental activities. A strong trend in this period of research is the phenomenological tendency. This tendency, concentrates on the process of perceiving and familiarizing the design situation. It allows design to be identified in interaction with precedents and cognitive schematas. Overall, contemporary studies are in line with “design as a discipline”, but they explore the subject on a higher and more complex level and examine the subject using different intellectual principles and methods.

Although design thinking plays a fundamental role in all disciplines involved with design such as fashion design, graphic design, urban design and industrial design, however, it is a process that is not limited to such activities and its application benefits many other fields such as engineering, managerial, and entrepreneurial areas. The process of design thinking focuses on problem recognition, understanding and resolution and in this process, “Visual Thinking” is one of the main and most important stages. Visual thinking can include a cycle of imagination, discovering ideas and their visualization and in the process of design thinking, designers go through the visual thinking process over and over again until they reach the desired outcome and find solution to the problem. Although visual thinking is a term that emerged in the twentieth century, many historical evidences suggests that the stages of visualization of thoughts are not specific to contemporary era, because many artists such as Leonardo da Vinci have left us their thoughts and the outcome of their searches on their sketches and pictorial notes, and the review of these notes reveals their way of thinking. The process of visual thinking can be divided into different stages. The beginning or zero is the stage of problem formation, in which the basic requirement that the design process needs to address and resolve is defined and shared with the design team. Next step is problem recognition and in order to understand the different aspects of the issue, the designer begins studying. In the second stage, design thinking process enters the field of idea-finding; thus, the designer begins to design, draw and sketch and through visualization, s/he detects and records various solutions. Then, in the third stage, from among the proposed ideas and paths, s/he selects the most suitable idea for expansion and enters the fourth stage, which is the implementation of the solution achieved. Eventually, in the final stage, the implemented solution is examined and evaluated and its feedback determined. In the initial stages, in order to better understand the problem and its different dimensions, the designers use visualization and visual thinking and imagine the whole path of design thinking. When focusing in the second phase, which is the stage of thinking through the creation of drawing and sketches, the designer finds solutions and ideas through inner dialogue with his drawings. This study intends to identify the process of visual thinking and its features, as well as to identify its function in the design thinking process. The research process has been formed based on this question that “What are the influential indicators of visual thinking in design thinking?.  The present research is applied in terms of purpose and is descriptive-analytic in terms of method. Information and data required have been collected through the survey and review of written and electronic documents. Theories of scholars and researchers such as Donald Schön, Bryan Lawson and Paul Laseau in this field have been analyzed in order to identify the characteristics of visual thinking via reviewing the literature related to two topics of design thinking and visual thinking. Finally, the four indicators - dialogism, exploration, management of multiple ideas and reflection process– have been identified as influential factors in the process of visual thinking. Dialogism enables the designer towards interlocution and interaction with himself on one hand and negotiation with the design team on the other. Exploration paves the way for the unexpected discovery of new solutions. Management of multiple ideas prepares the conditions for the discovery of all ideas and the discovery of hidden relationships between them until they reach the creative and appropriate ideas. The reflection process plays a role in the development of the design process and conducts it in the right direction both during design layout and re-reading during the entire path of the thinking cycle. Having identified visual thinking features and following problem recognition through stages zero to five of the thinking process of design, the research reveals the function and key role of visual thinking. Visual thinking, as it has now become a crucial part of the conceptualization phase and has led to the discovery of various, creative solutions, is similar to the whole process of design thinking from the beginning to the end. Organizing and categorizing problem data and visualizing all stages of the project and their internal details has an important function which results in the development of guiding maps for the designer, the design team, and also facilitates the achievement of a satisfactory solution and result.