قدریه ملکی

Statement of the problem: 

The Saqaqhana school is one of the most important artistic movements of the 1940s in Iran, which was formed with a traditionalist and at the same time innovative approach and was inspired by the global art method and the artists attributed to this movement are respected. Incorporating old visual elements, they created works that looked for differences in their art. The mentioned art can be studied from the field of culture, identity, art, etc., with structural, semiotic, psychological, etc. approaches. Many artists are active in this field, one of them is Nasser Owaisi, who can be considered as one of the prominent artists of this school.

Importance and necessity of conducting research:

 The present article aims to introduce and examine the visual characteristics and symbolic aspects of decorative motifs in selected works of the Saqaqhana school of painting by Nasser Owais, which is analyzed with the tools of structuralism and semiotics based on Peirce's point of view. They are explained.

Objectives of the article: 

The objective of this article is to analyze the symbolic aspects of decorative motifs in the works of Nasser Owaisi from Peirce's point of view.

Research question: 

Therefore, this article seeks to answer two basic questions: What are the visual characteristics of Naser Owaisi's Saqakhane paintings and what are the meanings of the decorative motifs? What is the performance of the semiotic approach in the selected works of Nasser Owaisi?

This research has been researched with a descriptive-analytical method. This article is a qualitative research and study samples are collected from library sources.

The results of this paper indicate that motifs are classified into six categories: abstract, human, animal, plant, and geometric motifs. written The painter has used motifs such as chamomile flowers, pomegranates, horses, women, shapes (squares, circles, triangles and rhombuses) and improvisational lines, objects such as three strings in his works, which are associated with concepts such as power , tolerance, pleasure, fertility, creation and freedom are related. Balance, equilibrium, movement are among the visual characteristics of these works. The signs of the decorative motifs of the above-mentioned artist's works are mostly symbolic and indexical and are considered figurative-abstract and abstract-similatory signs.

Saqakhaneh School of Painting was an art movement that was formed in the 1340s using elements of modern art and some traditional-religious and ancient elements in Iran. Saqakhaneh painters were trying to give their works an ethnic-Iranian identity. Artists attributed to this movement, while honoring ancient pictorial elements, created works that sought to differentiate their art. Using ancient art, they established a link between modern art and traditional art. What can be seen more in the study of Saqakhaneh's works are visual-symbolic elements that arise from deep themes and intellectual foundations. In the science of semiotics, the types of signs and the rules and principles of thought are studied. Also in this science, the codes of visual and written semiotics in Sadegh Tabrizi's works are explained by considering the alignment of his works with the objectives of this research. Therefore, this research tries to introduce and identify the works of this artist, to examine the characteristics of visual elements in his paintings, and also to explain the structure and themes of these visual elements with a semiotic approach. Therefore, two basic questions are raised in this research: What visual elements do the visual elements in Sadegh Tabrizi's works have? What kind of sign structure do these elements have, in other words, how does the semiotic approach work in the selected works? This research is descriptive-analytical with qualitative method and also the collection of information has been done in the form of library and internet. The result of the research showed; In Sadegh Tabrizi's works, visual signs are classified into six categories. In general, visual elements are more indexical and symbolic. The largest volume of pictorial elements is of the symbolic-iconic type and is composed of figurative and simplistic abstract signs and is the least naturalistic sign. In the study samples, the commonalities between the visual signs as well as the semiotic divisions of the concepts have been observed a lot. Written motifs have a special place in Tabrizi's works, which are combined with religious and spiritual themes and the Iranian third line. These motifs have been observed in all works. Plant motifs are more symbolic and human and animal motifs are more iconic.

The civilizations of Iran and China have had cultural exchanges for a long time, and significant artistic commonalities between the two countries in different historical periods are evident. One of the common artistic manifestations between these two civilizations with a rich cultural background is pottery. Among these, the dragon is one of the symbolic motifs whose presence can be seen in the oldest literary sources of Iran and China. On the other hand, the role of the dragon has a special place in the Islamic era in Iran and the Ming and Yuan eras in China among the art of pottery. The dragon was mostly used on pottery in the Timurid and Safavid periods and can be an imitation of past examples. One of the most important necessities of the research is a comparative study of the design and role and symbolic recognition of the dragon in Iran and China. So far, no independent research has been done on it. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to determine the role of the dragon in the symbolic concepts of Iranian and Chinese art? How did the role of the Chinese dragon enter the art of Iranian pottery directly and without changing its nature? Since Chinese art and culture are somehow intertwined with the dragon and China is basically the birthplace of the dragon, by examining the role of the dragon on the pottery of the Timurid, Safavid and Ming periods, we can better understand and examine the reasons for differentiation and sharing in pottery. The present research has been done with a comparative approach and based on a descriptive-analytical method and its data collection has been done in a library method. The results show that in Iran the role of the dragon is similar to each other and also with the use of decorative elements and plant motifs in the pottery of this period are different in terms of shape and size. The Iranian artist has paid attention to its Chinese meaning and meaning, and in the pottery works of this period, the dragon is sometimes depicted alone and sometimes not alone. But in the Ming Dynasty the shape of the dragon was different and the artist portrayed the dragon as the main role alone on the pottery.