فصلنامه کیمیای هنر
پیاپی 33 (زمستان 1398)

When treated like texts with their own visual language, illustrations from the Shiraz School of miniature are a mixture of the syntagmatic and paradigmatic relations of signs. Syntagmatic relations reveal the different ways the elements of a text are connected, while paradigmatic relations identify the sets of signifiers that signify the content of the text, dealing with intratextual and intertextual relations respectively. The resulting correspondence eventually shapes the structure of the illustrations, which in turn gives meaning to the signs therein. Aiming to analyze the types of those relations and their transformations, this research tries to enhance how the narrative of these illustrations, as visual media, is perceived and recalled. Reviewing the existing literature, this descriptive/analytical research concludes that Shiraz School miniatures featured different types of syntagmatic and paradigmatic relations and transformations.

Contemporary Iranian art, being affected by social context and events, and also sociological issues, has a critical approach. One of the formats that contemporary art uses to represent body and its pain is grotesque. Grotesque is a concept diversified over time which includes new definitions in contemporary art and contrasts with common principles of representation. The question is that why the body in these works of art turns into a medium to represent pain, suffering and tension? To answer the question, this research analyses contemporary figurative paintings by taking advantage of  Mikhail Bakhtin’s views in this field. In these works of art, the coherence and integrity of the body is lost and their defamiliarization of the body is an attempt to make shock in the image. Fragmentation, deformation, demolition and metamorphosis are the most important features of the new state of this body. This study is qualitative, done in a descriptive-analytic method and the data collection is done via field study and library sources.

Iqa’, one of the components of Islamic auditory arts, is a part of the writings of Muslim scholars. This study, with a cross-disciplinary approach, seeks to identify the thinking system of Iranian Muslim scholars from the seventh century AH to the contemporary period in looking at iqa’; it is based on a qualitative methodology with an interpretive paradigm and qualitative content analysis. The research population is those scientific works of the mentioned scholars which deal with the topic of iqa’ science and the sample group has been selected from this population with the reputational case sampling approach - which is one of the types of purposive sampling. The primary concepts that were extracted during open coding, when concentrated, resulted in three main categories: 1- Qualitative attitude to the time of the iqa’at; 2- symbolistic attitude towards iqa’i strokes, feet, cycles, times and meters; 3- attitude of believing in the similarity of the principles of traditional art and divine art, to cyclic and non-cyclic iqa’at. The convergence of these three categories resulted in the core category of this interpretive study: “wisdom attitude to iqa’”. The conclusion obtained from this research is that the intellectual system of Iranian Muslim scholars from the seventh century AH to the contemporary period, in their attitude towards Iqa’ (along with its related concepts), is based on “wisdom” which is realized in turn, in the shadow of “religion” and “tradition”.

Phenomenology as one of the philosophical fields of the twentieth century, was used in the last decades of this century as an effective approach to better understanding in architectural theorizing. The present study examines the viewpoints of Juhani Pallasmaa and Steven Holl through their key concepts, with the aim of showing the commonalities and differences of their views and explaining more clearly the method of architectural phenomenology. The results of the study reveal that under the influence of Maurice Merleau-Ponty, the multi-sensory and embodied perception of architecture is a key common concept to the theories of this two architects. The critique of retinal architecture, the focus on touch and tactility, memory and imagination, silence and slowness in Pallasmaa’s theories, are in line with the concepts of light, colors, parallax, and duration in Holl’s theories. On the other hand, although form is one of the themes of Steven Holl’s theories, Juhani Pallasmaa emphasizes the non-priority of form in architecture by proposing the concept of atmosphere. The present research has been done qualitatively by descriptive-analytical method.

In his Meditationes philosophicae de nonnullis ad poema pertinentibus Baumgarten famously called for Aesthetics, which he considered a branch of knowledge of the clear but confused perceptions that could not be reduced to any other kind of more distinct knowledge. This took place in a context of both Leibnizian-Wolffian Rationalism and Pietism. Regarding the first, Baumgarten used Leibniz’s taxonomy of ideas and depended on the Wolffian method, by using of which he tried to prove the possibility of what he called a “philosophical poetics”. His Poetics was mainly based on theories of Horace in his Ars Poetica. Regarding the second, he was influenced by the ideas about moral education by means of affections, present in the works of pietists such as August Hermann Francke about interpreting scriptures. Besides, it is crucial to draw attention to theological and biblical background of the word “aesthetics”. In the Bible, early christian texts and also in a book by Francke himself, “aisthesis” is an internal and spiritual perception, an insight based on affections. In this paper I have tried to put together these different aspects of the context of the Meditationes in a whole picture. I have concluded that based on this text by Baumgarten: there is always a notion of a “rule” present in aesthetics and it can also be interpreted in defence of poetry (and art) as a means of moral education by way of affections.

Ferdowsi’s Shahnameh is one of the greatest epic poems in the world. The outstanding values of this poem have not been hidden from the painters of different periods and they have drawn illustrations for many stories of Shahnameh. The combat of Rostam and Sohrab has been one of the most interesting themes for these painters. Due to the existence of different layers of meaning in Shahnameh, Shahnameh painting also provides very valuable raw materials for identifying signs and codes. In fact, the science of semiotics provides us with the ability to identify and reread these drawings to better understand this outstanding work. Considering the importance of characterization in the story of Rostam and Sohrab and the design of icons which are in appropriate accordance to the prominent characters in paintings, this study tries to semiotically analyze the most important character of Shahnameh, namely Rostam in the paintings of different periods. Since in Pierce’s semiotic method a sign is treated as having three dimensions and the role of the interpreter and his perception of “interpretation” is given importance, 15 drawings from this section of Shahnameh are selected and analyzed from the point of view of this thinker. This research is fundamental in terms of its goal; has a descriptive-analytical nature and lean on field and documentary methods for collecting data. At the end, it is concluded that painters’ connection with the subject of the story and the way they depict them have to do with hearing the story, receiving its linguistic-spoken messages, reading the text of the story through linguistic-textual messages, and seeing pre-existing images. The final outcome is formed and transferred to the audience with the intervention of the individual painter’s thought and creativity and the use of visual elements (both text and image) in the form of drawings. Generally, in order to introduce Rustam to their audience, painters have often used signs with a conventional relationship in the symbolic aspect and cause and effect relationship in the index aspect.