پژوهشنامه فرهنگستان هنر
پیاپی 7 (بهمن و اسفند 1386)

This article explains and illuminates the connections between the Islamic art and the divine word. Calligrraphy and architecture as the authentic and holly arts have a high and unique position among other kinds, regarding the Islamic art. Revelation which basically manifests the divine word as something spiritual finds a concrete form in calligraphy. The appearance of the divine words in the form of calligraphy presented the sacred as something material, worldly, and tangible, and this was the beginning and flourishing of the Islamic art. The external manifestation of the divine word was accompanied by the symbolic geometrical forms which recited the presence of unity in plurality. What helped calligraphy develop rapidly was its link with the Islamic architecture, which was a means to visualize the divine word. Void as the presence of the invisible and the unity, two adjectives used with the word Allah, has become in calligraphy and architecture an especial symbolic presence and manifestation. Considering all, what makes Islamic art distinguishable from other arts is this connection with the revelation.

In the area of human science, knowledge always entails parallel paradigms and research has been possible in the frame of paradigms; it is also true of the art. Aesthetic theories have never been unified in nature and never been single paradigmatic. Hermeneutics, however, is now single paradigmatic and art research can be done in a different manner free from the previous and current paradigms. This article introduces the ontological and epistemological aspects of this paradigm.

Artistic and aesthetic theories of the holistic and essentialist philosophers such as Hegel and Heidegger originate from their philosophical thoughts. While having essential differences in their philosophical perspectives, these two philosophers relate the same story about the death of the grand art in the modern era. This article is an attempt to identify the connections between the philosophical views of theses two philosophers and their approaches to art and artistic works. The study of these connections without any prior intention was led to some comparisons and criticism among which are: a comparison between the Hegelian system and Descartes’ essentialism based on the roots and the origins, and also Adorono’s radical criticism of Hegel’s essentialism. In the last part of the article, I will discuss these philosophers’ theorizations about the death of the art taking the advantage of Kafka’s works to examine their theories. To Hegel, art works as a tool to concretize the abstract and meta-philosophical notions. A fine example of art is the Greek sculpture because it, opposite to the symbolic art of the myth era and the Christian romantic art, considers the intelligible and sensible as the same. To Heidegger, on the other hand, the importance of art manifests itself in the attendance of truth in the concrete forms of art. Finally, what we call the truth, even from Heidegger’s point of view, has different manifestations in different eras. The truth of the technological era, which is called Gestalt by Heidegger, is the closure of the truth itself. If Kafka’s metaphors shed light on this closure what will be the position of his art in the world of nothingness and greatness?

The genetic criticism in its current usage initiated when some of the critics and those who were interested in manuscripts, especially French manuscripts, founded the “Institute of Works and Manuscript Preservation” and published a specialized journal in this field named “ Origin”, and by this they practically started their studies on avan-texts and the way the works come into being. Despite the other kinds of criticism which work on the final text as something fixed and established, genetic criticism, on the other hand, starts its job from movement to fixity. Avan-texts, including handwritings, letters, notes, expanded plans to write a text, memories and so on, are the truth and the silent movements of the published text. The study of these factors reveals the author’s unfinished words, the possible world, probable creativities, plans, expected methods, obsessions, and temptations which are not present in the published text and pave the ways to the other critical approaches. At this point, a genetic critic attempts to delineate the borders between the texts, and to clarify how the mechanism of each work functions to flourish creativity.

Genetic criticism, as most critical approaches, has a literary origin and soon entered other areas such as art, science, and philosophy. The genetic study of some arts like visual arts and cinema is more expanded in the scope than that of literature. The avan-texts in art include various forms and enjoy especial aesthetic and stylistic values so that they have attracted the attention of art collector since long ago. In addition to reviewing the characteristics of genetic criticism of arts, this article tries to study the genetic criticism of paintings. Finally, to elucidates and delineates the application of this approach, the article presents the findiings related to the study of Mona Lisa.

This article, while studying the factors involved in creating a painting such as avan-texts, para-texts, metatexts and so on, scrutinizes the process of the creation of a painting. To do so, I have chosen Guenica by Picasso and tried to make known the artist’s motivations, thoughts, Spain’s social-political condition, and early drawings such as etudes, sketches, and color sketches, which chronologically led to the final work. Then I have examined each of them comparing to the final work. The genealogy of the work ends with the creation and completion of the final work.

It is a new experience by itself to apply genetic criticism on the works of a contemporary Iranian painter. This article applies this method to a work by Said Moayerizadeh. The stages of the completion of this work named “Paper Clothes”, the related data and documents are studied in four propositions: Firstly, avan-texts including early sketches, secondly: para-texts including the events which have happened during the time of creation and have influenced the process of creation, thirdly: meta-texts which are the artist’s explanation of the whole process of the creation, and finally, hypo-texts including all the autonomous works which helped the creation of this work.