mohammadreza moridi

Illustrated books are among the most important cultural products made for the Young Adult age group which aim to represent the issues related to adolescent life in different literary genres. These literary genres are divided into different categories, such as textbooks, scientific books, poetry books, fiction, and translated fiction. The samples examined here are from the illustrated fiction genre. These books’ unique feature of narrating stories from the heart of society and the culture from which they spring, can indirectly introduce young adults to fundamental concepts and issues such as the cultural identity of their Homeland. Cultural identity is by far one of the most meaningful constituents of the national identity of a country. Especially in the era of globalization and in the countries facing this phenomenon, understanding the components of identity, especially cultural identity, is considered vital for young adults. These categories encompass the G, D, and H rating categories (which include children’s books, middle grade, and parental guidance ratings in the Iranian rating system) and overall the young adult category (ages ten to fifteen in Iran), which means they are at an age where they are curious about cultural and social phenomena around them as well as being at their most impressionable life stage. This review aims to introduce the components of the Iranian cultural identity and analyze how these components are represented in illustrated YA books. The methodology here is a descriptive-analytical approach, and the social semiotic method introduced by Gunther Kress and Theo Van Leeuwen is employed for visual analysis and semiotics; however, it must be noted that, unlike other studies that solely focus on visual social semiotics introduced by the aforementioned in their book titled “Reading Images” when it comes to analyzing visual language, this paper will focus on this method to the extent that it is relevant to ‘social semiotics.’ The research samples are selected from the illustrated YA fiction books that were submitted to three cycles of the “Top Book of the Year Festival” organized by the Cultural Association of Children’s Book Publishers in the 2010s. A total of 230 titles were selected by the biennial festival, 47 of which were considered cultural artworks. This article is based on Laleh Jahanbakhsh’s dissertation titled “An Overview of the Representation of National Identity in Illustrated YA books. Case study: titles submitted to four biennial cycles at the “Top Book of the Year Festival” organized by the Cultural Association of Children’s Book Publishers in the 2010s” under the supervision of Dr. Hassan Soltani, Tehran University of Art. Due to the word limit, this article focuses on three titles selected from the aforementioned category that discuss cultural identity. These titles were researched and analyzed using social semiotics, and the result is presented here. These titles were selected using purposive sampling. Each of the three titles represents an important component of cultural identity. The first component is language, which has been used in the most famous literary titles recorded in different periods of Iranian history as a part of Iranian culture. The second component is ancient Iranian mythological figures, which are widely discussed in titles such as Shahnameh (The Epic of Kings by Ferdowsi). The third component is customs, traditions, rituals, beliefs, and values, the sum of which is known as the cultural heritage of Iran. These titles were accessed in the field and also observed as photographs.This paper aims to answer three questions: Firstly, what are the components that make up the cultural identity that’s represented in Illustrated YA books? Secondly, what are the cultural resources that illustrators use in their work? Thirdly, how do designers and illustrators use the available cultural resources concerning the context of the society in which they present their work? This research paper hypothesizes that many visual resources survive from many different art movements and cultural eras and are still available to this day. Designers and illustrators influenced by contemporary visual trends can use these rich visual resources to introduce and familiarize their YA audience with the authentic Iranian visual culture in addition to creating new and innovative art that is in tandem with the demands and tastes of the culture, society, and the audience who would be consuming these new artworks. The research proved that three general categories were used more often by illustrators to introduce cultural identity in the sample books. The first component is language, which has been used in the most famous literary titles recorded in different periods of Iranian history as a part of Iranian culture. The second component is ancient Iranian mythological figures, and the third component is the customs, traditions, rituals, beliefs, and values, the sum of which is known as the cultural heritage of Iran. To answer the second and third questions, three picture samples were selected from the illustrated YA books. Each title reflected one of the three components of cultural identity when it was submitted to the Cultural Association of Children’s Book Publishers. Social semiotics and visual social semiotics were used to analyze these samples. The results showed that designers chose elements from the available cultural, visual, and symbolic resources that already exist based on the societal and cultural context and the genre in which their work is presented. As we saw in the picture of the “Rostam and Sohrab and a Celebration Called Sadeh” book, the illustrator was inspired by the Iranian illustrations in different eras, beginning with the Parthian murals to the coffee house paintings. The illustrator attempts to represent an authentic Iranian atmosphere by combining these styles with contemporary visual art. This method supports the traditional Iranian culture and can also create a new visual atmosphere based on the social context and the genre of the illustrated YA book. These individual choices were made based on the personal interests of the artist and in compliance with the principles of clarity and proportionality. The illustrators also use a new signification process to convert the old signs and symbols into new signs and symbols to fit the new context in which the images will be presented. This works differently in the images relating to “Their hands smelled of flowers.” In that sample, the illustrator may not have been inspired by the different eras of Iranian visual culture, but the elements, signs, and tools used by the illustrator show visual references to the era in which the story of the book takes place. Therefore, people’s unique social nature and their access to cultural resources that are socially constructed indicate they are active participants in the processes of semiotics and communication.

Social documentary photography of Iran has a small contribution in representing the problem of subalternity and contrary to the claim of pure depiction, the photographic representation of subalternity relies on social, cultural and political discourses. The aim of this article is to analyze the discourse of subalternity in its photographic representation. For achieving this, the social documentary photos of Iran between the 1970s and 2010s, have been studied by purposive sampling in the qualitative method of discourse analysis. According to Foucault's interpretation it is shown how photography as an institutional apparatus has represented the discourse of Iran’s subalternity which have been formulated by foregrounding some statement in each decade. The results of this article showed that the photographic representation of the discourse of subaleternity can be divided into three distinct periods; First, the representation of the subaltern with the main statement of "proletarit" and "mustazaf" in the social discourse of the 1970s were often called to the scene of the revolution by representing ideal bodies as a symbol of resistance. Second, the representation of the subaltern with the main proposition of "vulnerable class" in the cultural discourse of the 1990s, which often becoming visible in a metamorphosed form in the gallery by the representation of passive and idle bodies with the lost innocence. Third, the representation of the subaltern with the main statement of "abnormal", "less privileged" or "unproductive groups" in the neoliberalism discourse of the 2010s, often became subjugated and invisible as potential criminals by the representation of Grotesque and exotic bodies, then being exiled to places far away from the consumer society.

Comparative study of modern art in Iran, Iraq, and Pakistan explain aspects of indigenous in modern art. In this article we examine these questions: how did avant-garde artists in these countries attempt to find and match modern art with indigenous art? How did they experience indigenous modernities in art? In this article, by adopting a historical-comparative sociological approach, we analyze the experiences of modern art in the works of Jalil Ziapour (in Iran), Javad Salim (in Iraq) and Shaker Ali (in Pakistan). The results show that the structural similarities in the art of these countries, which can be called parallel histories, can be examined at three levels: 1) The social context of the time: Especially in the middle of the 20th century, when the discourse of nationalism was influential in the formation of national culture, and governments sought to create a stream of national art that was both historical and modern, 2) Dominant artistic models of the era: Specifically the art academies of Paris and London, which transmitted the methods of teaching and art schools to international students and 3) Trying to shape the national school of art: Artists from peripheral countries were looking for an art form that represented both the universal language of art and the ability to build a national school. Cubism style was the answer to this problem and played an important role in shaping the national school of art. Three artists tried to return to the historical heritage and connect it with the combinations of Cubism. Javad Salim sought to integrate Islamic images and the heritage of Mesopotamian art with modern formalism and cubism; Jalil Ziapour emphasized the Iranian origin of Cubism, that is, the geometry of Islamic motifs as the background of modern abstraction; Shakir Ali, as a avant-garde artist, tried to learn traditional miniatures, because he believed that there is a link between this historical heritage and modern art. The achievements of these artists cannot be considered only as a modality of European art; Just as they sought to go beyond the formalist adaptation of modern art to indigenous subjects and experience a indigenous modernity in art.

Cinema is intertwined with politics. Political systems have tried to control and use cinema for their own advantage. The genre that is called "FilmFarsi" and produced in the years before and after the revolution in 1979 has served a political function.FilmFarsi refers to popular and commercial cinema in the 1950s to 1980s; although, as a cinematic genre, it was also produced after the Islamic revolution and continues today. This genre was often romantic popular melodramas with simplification of characters and situations. FilmFarsi seems to display the modernization of Iranian society and its conflicts and challenges with tradition. Of course, these challenges were often very unpretentious and superficial. Dancing and singing were elements of this genre, to which the critics became culturally sensitivite, and after the revolution, these aspects and traits of films were considered vulgare and trite,  and therefore, these types of films were seized to be produced.In this article, we will deal with the Jahel, Loti, Lumpen and Kolah Makhmali (velvet hats) in popular cinema to explain how and why these characters appeared in the Iranian cinema and how they show the mentality, dreams and aspirations of the people of the time. To address these questions, by using the methodology of discourse analysis, in order to study the narrative structure, grammatical and visual system of the films, we have paid attention to three levels: descriptive analysis, discourse action and social function of the text of films.Our findings show that the character (Jahel, Loti, Lumpen, Kolah Makhmali) has two opposite sides, positive and negative. On the one hand, as a Dervish, he is indifferent to the world and worldly possessions, and on the other hand, like a lumpen, he seeks benefits and wealth in any way possible. Little by little, from the 1950s to the 1970s, the positive image of this charcter in the Iranian cinema decreased and his negative and rebellious images persisted in the public cultrue.Jahel in the cinema became a symbol of male authority and protection of traditions, especially in the face of strangers. They were the sign of the tradition who maintained religious customs, although they were flexible and could connect these traditions with modernity. The discursive function of FilmFarsi, especially films centered on the Jahel, was the narration of coexistence and the connection of traditional and modern aspects; A narrative that was of interest to Pahlavi II cultural institutions; Because in that time the conflict between traditional and modern forces was becoming radicalized and the concern about the gap in values was causing the society to face a crisis.Also, Jahel character (or Lumpen, Kolahmakhmali) in popular cinema was able to building fantasy world, by simplification social phenomena such as social rupture (between traditional and modern), cultural distance (between elite and ordinary), class gap, and Conflict of interest (minority and majority), to make people's dreams and aspirations come true. By constructing these falsified facts, they reproduce the hegemonic political system and establish social order.

Persian painting has been well known as a traditional art with a deep-rooted history, evolving consistently in accordance with traditions and the context of cultural changes of the society of its respective age. Therefore, compared to the previous ones, each historical period observes some modernity. As with other arts in today's Iranian society, Persian painting is not simply encountered with describing an integrated image of the sovereignty of thought; thus, with the purpose of analyzing the effects of discourse changes on creating modernity in contemporary Persian painting, the present article addresses the question that, in the context of political and social changes, what distinctive reading of modernity has emerged in contemporary Persian painting. “Ernesto Laclau’s and Chantal Mouffe’s" discourse analysis approach was used to show how some of the central signifiers are highlighted while others are marginalized in this argument; finally, discourse formulation is presented.Comparative methodology and descriptive-analytical research method were used for data collection which was implemented by examining library and field documents using fiche and imaging tool. The observed samples of contemporary Persian paintings were selected randomly from the works painted after the constitutional period (1385-1285 AH). After the Constitutional Revolution and following the political, economic, and cultural reformations that began in the late Qajar dynasty and culminated in the Pahlavi period in Iran, there was a tendency towards traditionalism and modernism. Modernizations in contemporary Persian painting can be analyzed based on four social discourses: “modern traditionalism”, “traditional modernity”, “ideological traditionalism”, and “divergence of tradition”. The results indicate that the generating forces associated with the central signifier lead to modernity in contemporary Persian painting.Persian painting in modern traditionalism discourse, beginning with the Constitutional Revolution and culminating in the first Pahlavi period and, more or less, present in both second Pahlavi and the Islamic Revolution periods, becomes hegemonic via nodal point of continuation of tradition. In this discourse, painting is reflected in the equivalence chain of historicism and nationalism and tries to hegemonize the tendency towards myth, Persian poetry and the literature of ancient Persian art by creating a chain of equivalence between the floating signifiers of historicism and archaism. Therefore, Persian painting in the ancient traditionalism discourse was engaged in competition and dispute between the naturalist method and returning to the traditional Persian painting schools. Although continuation of tradition is hegemonic in this discourse, it could achieve some innovations through using some generating forces such as court modernists (Qajar period) and the middle class as new supporters and applicants, new educational institutions, and the audience of Khayyam's quatrains. Persian painting in the discourse of traditionalist modernity was mainly formed in the first Pahlavi period with the Saqqa-Khaneh movement and in the reformation period of the Islamic Republic with post-revolutionary modernism and articulation of returning to tradition as a nodal point and elements such as decorativism, formalism, localism, and modernism. In this discourse, the art of Persian painting entered into a competition between formalism and narrativism, and finally won the battle by integrating tradition and modernism. The new middle class as well as the intellectuals of the Pahlavi government, in addition to the reformists of the Islamic Republic in 1990s, educational institutions, and art exhibitions and festivals can be considered as the most influential factors in the modernity of this discourse. In ideological traditionalism discourse, Persian painting was established by articulating the ideological reading of tradition as a nodal point and floating signifiers such as Shiite Islamism, historical Islamism, and Islamic mysticism. Moreover, here, Persian painting is identified against artistic formalism – its rival – and is located in the chain of equivalence of integrating ideological expressiveness and traditional Persian painting. Modernity in the Persian painting of this discourse can be related to the influence of revolutionary fundamentalists and art-supporting revolutionary institutions which directed national and international festivals. In the discourse of divergence of tradition, Persia painting was developed through articulating traditionalism outside of the context of tradition as the nodal point and floating signifiers such as a critical attitude towards of tradition, the heterogeneous coexistence of traditional symbols with contemporary life and multiple identities. In this discourse, Persian painting is in the chain of equivalence of challenges of traditional life in the postmodern era and traditional Persian painting is opposed to its rival, traditionalism, in form and content. Meanwhile, new artistic tools and media as well as new world markets of art, and especially the migration of artists from their homeland, are among the most important areas of modernity in Persian painting in the discourse of world art.

Egypt’s modern art was formed in the background of independence wars, leftist ideology, and nationalist sentiments during the 1920s to 1960s. Modern Egyptian artists were looking for native, national, and Egyptian art so that they could depict the wholeness of Egypt through it. Contrary to the idea that modern art is a western and European phenomenon, artists from non-western countries such as Egypt have achieved important experiences in local, national, and non-western artistic modernism. However, in modern art historiography, these experiences are often ignored and given less attention. In this article, we will address these questions: How was Egyptian artistic modernism formed? How did Egyptian nationalism affect the national and Egyptian artistic movements? What experiences did the artists achieve in Egypt? To answer these questions, the historical research method is used to draw an inferential process of the evolution of modern Egyptian art by collecting the documents and studying the available sources. The purpose of this research is to investigate the formation of modern art in Egypt as a non-western country and the shedding light on political, social, and cultural nationalism in that country. The current research was done qualitatively and descriptively and analytically using the historical research method.The results of the research showed that three sub-currents should be distinguished in Egyptian nationalism and artists influenced by these three currents reflecting different experiences of modern Egyptian art. Including 1. Cultural nationalism: archaic and historicist (like the works of Mahmoud Mokhtar), 2. Social nationalism: localist and landscape (like the works of Ragheb Ayad), 3. Political nationalism: expressive and socialist (like the works of Abd al-Hadi Al-Jar). Examining the artists’ works indicated their efforts in shaping local and national artistic modernism. These experiences of Egyptian artists inspired many artists in the Arab world during the years 1920 to 1960.

Contemporary art, in the age of globalization, goes beyond the narrative of national art. Contemporary art is based on multicultural, multinational experiences and hybrid identities. In the intersection of cultures it is possible to form contemporary art. Just as Qatar and the United Arab Emirates are trying to shape the contemporary art in the region as multinational and multicultural countries. Multiculturalism in these countries is due to the accumulation of foreign and international labor. Since more than 80 percent of their population is foreign labor, Qatar and the UAE prefer to follow the transnational identity and art by emphasizing multicultural policies. They want to be known as a "contact zone" or "trans-place". Transnational is a dream land in the universal modernity; in this land, the boundaries of identities are merged and have gained universal unity. A unity beyond the differences that can be formed in a “trans-place”. Bur from a critical point of view, trans-place is not a place for all people or any person from every culture. Actually this space is kind of non-place; where it does not point to any geography, climate or history; the Sterilized space from history, memory and culture.  Marc Augé- French anthropologist- used the term "non-place" to refer to spaces where concerns of relations, history, and identity are erased. Dubai and Doha want to be utopia base on trans-place, trans-modern and transnational; but the non-place is the opposite of utopia: it exists, but it does not contain any organic society. Despite these criticisms, the policy of the United Arab Emirates and Qatar is to shape trance-place. They are international and transnational regions. In this meaning, these regions are not only an opportunity for exchange international art, but also they are a context for the development of transnational art. But how can transnational art be made? The methodological approach of this article is trend analysis. Trend of political change that drives cultural policy making and artistic movement. This article explain how Arab oil-rich countries have established museums and festivals by oil budget and have affected new Arab art movement. In this article we do research the trend of paradigm shift of national art to transnational Art by studying of collection of events (Museums and Art Exhibitions) and art works (Artists' experiences). The results of the study of art movements in the United Arab Emirates and Qatar, showed that in general, three characteristics for art can be enumerated in the transnational paradigm: 1. the creation of contemporary Islamic art as a multicultural experience. 2. Creation of digital and technology-oriented works of art; 3. Creation of environmental works of art as a common chapter of cultures and nationalities. This artistic movements are supported by the artistic events in the region. But these policies are associated with many problems. Critically, these transnationalism developments are alien to the indigenous and traditional culture of these countries; also, these events display the global capitalist economy rather than being an arena for transnational art. Evaluating transnational and transcultural policies needs further study.

The display of Islamic artworks has not had a uniform, integrated and stable narrative; these works have been displayed in different exhibitions in different ways and the concept of Islamic art has also been influenced by Islamic art exhibitions. Therefore, studying the works of Islamic art in exhibitions can reveal the hidden ideologies and direction in these art events.Exhibitions are not neutral and unbiased; they have special cultural and political connotation. According to Timothy Mitchell, these events select and arrange works based on the "Exhibitionary Order"; Exhibition order finds rules over time and imposes norms on the understanding and interpretation of works and objects. Therefore, the study of art events (exhibitions, biennials and festivals) is a good approach to explain how to interpret and recognize works of art. It is from this perspective that we can know how the works of Islamic art were known, interpreted and understood in different periods. In this article, we discuss the impact of art events on the introduction, collection and documentation of Islamic art; events that give direction to the art history and selection process of museums. These artistic events have influenced the introduction, collection, documentation, categorization and conceptualization of Islamic art.The present research method is based on event studies. Study of art events (exhibitions, biennials and festivals) is a good approach to explain the complex relationship between art and reality. Nathalie Heinich sees the study of artistic events as a pragmatic approach in the sociology of art that studies how values are produced and reproduced in exhibitions. In this article, we pursue the methodological questions of how these exhibitions present Islamic art. How do they shape narratives of Islamic art influenced by dominant artistic discourses and currents? In this article, the events and exhibitions of Islamic art in the three discourses of Colonialism, Nationalism and Globalism are studied and this question has arisen that: how three different narratives of Islamic art in the colonial, national and global discourses were formed? The event’s study can analyze the hidden and ideological functions of exhibitions in the construction of art history. The Data collection method in this article is documentary analysis and data organization is based on the trend analysis.The results of this article distinguish three currents of "world fair", "national festivals" and "art biennials". The world fair began with the first exhibition in 1851 and continued until the Mohammadi Art Exhibition in 1910 in Munich. The event, sponsored by one country each year, was an arena for the colonial powers to compete and show their power and influence around the world. The Ottomans, first participated in the 1867 Paris Exhibition, and Iran was the first to officially attend the 1873 Vienna Exhibition. Influenced by the development of French colonialism, the Egyptian and Moroccan pavilions gradually held more significant pavilions at world fairs. After the 1870s, unlike previous periods when booths were categorized by country, a special hall was created as Islamic art, which included works from Iran, Arabia, Turkey, Egypt and India. This exhibition was an important step in documenting Islamic art and changing attitudes towards Islamic art. Actually, In these exhibitions, under the influence of the West and influenced by the colonial discourse, that Oriental-Islamic objects and subjects were selected and acquired by Western museums; it was during this period that works and objects were collected, categorized and named, and an Orientalist conception of Islamic art was formed.In the first half of the twentieth century, with the development of the nationalist discourse and the establishment of new governments in Iran and the Arab countries, a new stream of national festivals and festivals began. In these exhibitions, which lasted from the 1920s to the end of the 1960s, Islamic art was considered as cultural heritage and part of national wealth, and the nationalist narrative dominated Islamic art. During this period, exhibitions were held not under the title of Islamic art, but on the basis of nations with the titles of art of Iran, Turkey, Iraq, Egypt and included works of Islamic art as part of the national heritage; the 1976 Islamic Art Exhibition marked the end of this stream. Since the 1980s, with the decline of nationalism and the rise of the globalization discourse, Islamic art exhibitions have entered a new phase. This time, Islamic art was presented as contemporary art in exhibitions, and the Biennial of Contemporary Art tried to present it as an artistic style beyond nationalism. However, what is displayed in these events as contemporary Islamic art is a narrative of contemporary art in Islamic lands. In other words, this current includes the experiences of contemporary art, which are often deconstructive and critical, rather than representative of Islamic art.

Conceptual jewelry, the result of the "contemporary" paradigm, has provided a platform for the expression of social and political ideas as well as the active presence of artists by challenging and criticizing the accepted concepts and principles in classical and modern jewelry. It prioritizes conceptual and artistic expression as a cultural medium. Jewelry is an expressive and symbolic work that implies cultural, political, and social values. For women jewelers, contemporary jewelry is a language to express ideas that show their position, desires, and wishes, simultaneously expressing their criticisms, objections, and views. Therefore, feminist theorists and gender identity activists pay special attention to jewelry.The aim of this study is to show how gender is represented as well as what position women have in Iranian conceptual jewelry. By means of a methodological approach of Fairclough discourse analysis, it searches for meaning in the critical implications of contemporary Iranian jewelry. The results show that jewelry is not only a sign of feminine beauty and aristocracy, but a medium to express a different identity of women, which criticizes concepts such as anonymity and feminism, gender discrimination, humiliation and rejection, gender stereotypes (e.g. the ideal body, beauty, sexual functions), and violence in public and private space, rethinking them all over. Contemporary jewelry artists act in response to the gender perspective and take a critical step in raising awareness of the subject of women.

Analyzing the role of the artist in human life is a challenging subject because it has always faced many stereotypes. meanwhile, the stereotypes of the genius artist and the engaged artist, with a reductionist view of the role of the artist, have ignored the power of the work of art in human life; Based on the views of Hannah Arendt, this article seeks to analyze the situation of the “artist-activist” and answer the question of how the work of art has affected human life and what is the active role of the artist in society?     Hannah Arendt, with her different perspective on human life, considers artists to be a unique group. He considers art to be a meaningful activity and works of art to a higher degree than other man-made objects. Arendt's thought conceives a special power in works of art; The power that takes these works out of the group of decorative objects and other human constructions and makes it a necessary activity in the society. In other words, the existence of such power in a work of art makes the role of the artist a sensitive situation in society that can affect society through his work. Arendt considers the activity of “action” to be one of the three fundamental and constructive activities of human life, and the most important of them, to distinguish it from the activities of “Labor” and “work”. Although a work of art is created through the activity of “work”, in order to be known as art, it enters the field of "action"; That is, it itself becomes a form of “action” in a field beyond “work”; Thus, the work of art redefines and articulates the public sphere. In essence, the artist in this situation is the one who, through his artistic action, demands a new story for every object in the heart of the public sphere, in order to disrupt the sensory monotony of the dominant story.     In this article, we analyze the role of the work of art in human life from its relation to storytelling to show that the artist can create a new “story” for each object through the work of art in the common world and builds a world of “stories” on the world of objects that are among us. In this formation, the artist is the one who, by creating a new story, destroys the conventional and established meanings, and by creating new meanings and relations between things, questions the immediacy of the obvious. Thus, artist-activist means launching a new story in the world of sensations through the work of art. An artist-activist is one who moves on the frontier of discourses and, by challenging traditional patterns of meaning and freeing objects from their usual connection, reborn that in the realm of art. in this formulation, the role of the artist is not in his direct reaction to the events of society; And it is not in his withdrawal from society, but in his active role in breaking down a particular system of feelings.

The history of contemporary Iranian photography has so far largely focused on the description of political and social events and their impact on the photography trend. While the description of this process may not be chronological, it must also study the developments of image and visual language of photograph, which itself has been changing along with politics and social life. To this end, in the present article, David Bolter and Richard Grusin's theory of the dual logic of "immediacy" and "hypermediacy" is adopted as an analytical approach.Bolter and Grusin, have categorized media into a spectrum ranging from Hypermediacy to Immediacy. They believe that from Renaissance onward media have had a development and inclination towards immediacy i.e. they have tried to present to their audience a more tangible and accessible realm. Along the above-mentioned spectrum the following could be enumerated; Perspective Painting, Photography, Cinema, Television and Digital Media. The movement towards immediacy or in fact the fluctuation between immediacy and hypermediacy has occurred within each medium as well.The result shows: From the 1980s to the 2000s, photography has changed from “immediacy” to “hypermediacy”, and from “appropriating outer reality” to “reflecting media reality.” Influenced by the Revolution and the War of the 1980s, photography was subdued by the outer reality, became but a channel for transfer, and itself had no opportunity and inclination for self-revelation; which means that in this period, the logic of immediacy was dominant. Photography aims to inform and arouse the audience by creating and strengthening a sense of facing the real time and place. In this decade, the understanding of photography was based on the appropriating outer reality, and the features of photographic imagery stemmed from the structure of reality, but in the following decades, the role of the media in reflecting reality is highlighted, and the experience of the photograph happens with the attitude that we encounter, not with reality, but with mediated and mediatized reality (organized with media), and in some cases only with the media itself. In 1990s, When the social and political upheavals of the mid-1980s had subsided and photographers heeded ordinary subjects in their surroundings, the expressive features of the photographer (style) and the visual characteristics of photos (form) were stressed further, and the medium got ample room for self-expression. In this decade, the academic environment of arts, among other factors, contributed to the logic of hypermediacy as well as immediacy. The new photography approach of the late 1990s was influenced by the political and social atmosphere and transboundary relations in photography. The increase in arts and photography opinion articles, upgrading photography education to the masters degree, and emphasizing the theoretical field have guided photography toward thought-oriented and conceptual approaches, and in turn, self-reflexivity and self-awareness (representations of hypermediacy). In the 2000s, largely influenced by new approaches to photography in the West and with greater attention to theoretical studies of art, photography shifted to self-contemplation and self-reference. This study is descriptive, analytical and qualitative, and using library research.

What is political art and how can art be political? Dealing with political art has always been a contentious issue because the prevalent notions of these two areas have made it difficult to determine a specific relationship; studying such a situation requires rethinking of concepts; by rethinking Jacques Rancière's thoughts, the concepts of “Politics” and “Aesthetic Art” will be reconsidered; this will help us open our way to answer what the political art is.Jacques Rancière's particular approach to both the arts and politics conqueror is the way for this research. Rancière considers the work of art to be a special distribution of time and space. In his view, the work of art has a complex connection with the common and the sensible. He believes that art and politics, as two separate but intertwined spaces, are shaping “the distribution of the sensible” and the common.In this article, by examining the concept of “Dissensus” in Jacques Rancière's thought, its redefines the concept of political art and shows that art is not political because it conveys a political message. A work of art by break from the usual experience, it forms a special function; a function that forms a form of “Dissensus”. The relationship between art and politics, as well as the relationship between art and society, must be understood in terms of “Dissensus” forms, not the political message or the subject that the work of art conveys. A work of art can release everything from previous status within the framework of “Dissensus” on its meaning or function. As a result, art is not political in that it is a direct protest or reaction to the events of society; on the contrary, the politics of art is in breaking down fixed contractual meanings and creating new meanings and relationships between things. Art and politics both represent forms of “Dissensus” Both of them, as two separate but intertwined spaces, are shaping the “distribution of the tangible” and the common; From this perspective, it is possible to reflect on the political intervention of artists, and what the arts offer to society is a change in physical positions and movements, theological functions, the division of visible and invisible things. A work of art can shape the space of society. Through a reshaping of the senses, the work of art affects everything that can be seen, heard, said, and even thought. In other words, artistic activities affect the way things are done, the forms of visibility, and the state of things in society. By redistributing the sensible the works of art influence the division of public space, the actions taken, and the type of participation in society. Through the work of art, the artist can deconstruct the superficial layers of social discourses and decipher them by revealing the state of things.

Cultural policymakers invite artists from the studio to the public space to make art public. But their selection from works of art is often politically motivated. Public art is linked to politics. Especially at important durations such as revolutionary events. In Iran, too, the Islamic Revolution had a profound effect on the meaning of public art, or art that can (or should) become public. After the revolution, some works of art were removed from the public space and replaced, and new works of art were displayed as memorials and murals. Artistic monuments are in line with political goals and reproduce political discourse. During the revolution, many artists became line up with this popular movement. Of course, just as in the years after the victory of the revolution there was a difference between the revolutionary forces with religious, liberal and Marxist tendencies, there was a difference of opinion in the definition of public art and art that should come to the public space. Just as religious forces overcame other revolutionary forces, religious arts with a religious orientation prevailed over other trends in the definition of public art.  Public art in Iran was a revolutionary art that was influenced on the one hand by Marxist tendencies and Latin American art, and on the other hand by religious views. The mural was derived from the conditions of the revolution and the visual language of the revolution, which continued in the following decades. Of course, with the political developments, the form and theme of the mural also changed.The goal of this article is how murals have become a visual representation of political discourses and manifestation of the systems of power. This study focuses specifically on murals from the 1980s, as its legacy was emphasized by cultural policymakers in Iran in later decades. Therefore, the main question of this research is this, what was the cause and context of the formation of mural painting in this decade? The methodology of this article to answer this question is qualitative and based on a grounded approach (Grounded Theory). The trend study in this research is based on documents, conversations and observations to describe the paradigm model (causal, intervening, strategy, consequence and context) of the emergence of the mural phenomenon. The results showed how the purification discourse and Cultural cleansing produced a form of public art with signs of enduring values, political unity, and the cohesion of collective morality in the 1980s. This movement of art, which can be described as committed art and Maktabi Art, included a picture of Shiite thought in murals, political messages and manifestations, and unifying themes.

Public art in Iran has undergone dramatic changes since the beginning of its development, and especially after the 80s when Social and discourse arts started to give way to decorative, formalist and abstract art. As a result of this process, reconstruction discourse which characterized by its social function and brought about social harmony and solidarity started to fade. So, the development of human and vibrant environments in the densely populated cities of the contemporary age is a need that has obsessed all urban authorities such as designers, planners and policymakers. Thus, taking into account the role of audience in retrieving and utilizing the spaces devoted to art and public art activities and improving the quality of democratic spaces, the researcher made attempts to investigate the contribution of public art components to creation of democratic atmosphere of the 80s in Tehran’s Ab-o-Atash Park. The Embedded Design Mixed Research Method was used to conduct the study. Atlasti and SPSS software were used in the qualitative and quantitative phases of the study, respectively. The results show that the public art components have most significantly contributed to creation of graffiti, structural elements, simultaneous displays, celebrations and lighting (each having a coefficient of determination of 1). Water fountains and elements devoted to celebrities and dignitaries (with coefficient of determination of 0.893) and building structures (with coefficient of determination of 0.846) were ranked second and third, respectively. The results showed that public art components have had the least contribution to creation of stone sculpture (0.427) and the amphitheater (0.362) and the ski resort (0.467) respectively. In the years after Revolution the public art in social discourses affected by three decades' purgation or sublimation discourse in 1960s with a nostalgic and unifying moral function followed a public ethics and sustainability. With the end of the war and beginning of the 70s, the daily life in Iran has been changed a lot and the ethics of here is bravery and errantry of the what time gave way to rationality and computation of the construction period. New generation took a distance from the heroes of 60s to shape his daily life in another way. Therefore, the main confliction is that the heroism life is the dominance of the danger and violence and going to the danger, while the daily life is the dominance of the women and the reproduction and care. Iran had the experience of Revolution and war a head, needed to the features and ethics of heroism in art, not a mediocre ethic that avoids danger. In fact, in the 1370s more common and routine subjects were proceeded the martyr's wall paintings and fronts gave their way gradually to the decorative, formalist and abstract paintings). The lifestyle of the youth and the street wanderings cherry that were considered as a kind of idleness at the beginning of 1380s and were regarded as a fruitless routine in the civility system, became the predominant form of youth life in the 1380s. They gained and uninhibited and free experience in wanderings that has trifled in all of the cultural, educational and political formations. Wandering is described as democratic urban consumer. The loiterer is the hero of the daily life and interested in urban beauties and elegances at best. Wandering is the production of space; wandering is the art of daily life and how to use the space is important by the loiterer. The beautification discourse of 1380s, with the cultural function resulted in the public the esprit, social joy and enthusiasm and beautification discourse. In the meantime, the artistic events undergone some changes. The general art is also changing gradually from the idealistic pictures (Heroes) to the routine and interactive (facilitator) pictures and symbols. The events that can stabilize the discourse space and bring the general esprit, and social joy and enthusiasm and the discourse beautification. Generally, by entering the art to the general arena, the factors affecting the meaning of Art changed under the influence of the cultural, social and political situations and fields, the personal and public audience, the authority powers and artists, all of were effective in creating the meaning of art. This change in relations is somehow a change in the discourse, and this discourse method of the general art is the result of social functions, special time and place. This research has tried to answer below question with the purpose of considering the role of the audience in recapturing and seizing and how to use the space in relation to artistic activities and general art and qualitative improvement of the democratic space supporting those the general art components is effective in the democratic creation and experience of the Water and Fire Park. * How much were effective the elements of the general art in creation and experience of the democratic space in the 80s, in the study sample of Tehran water and Fire Park? The relationship between the art and urban space has been beneficial for both phenomena during the history, but the speed of the developments of the past century has caused challenges in the relationship between the art and urban spaces in our country, so that the applied art in the city has an ordered and attached nature, not popular. With the extraction of general art elements by the deep interviews based on the individual experience of experts in space and its verification by the special audiences, this research tried to answer this important question that: how much does the contribution of each of the general arts presented in the water and Fire Park effects on space production and the democratic experience in the space. During the qualitative section and the deep interviews, it was found that there are most of the activities in the space that should be accomplished to be able to comprehend the general art related to that, therefore, in this research the type of activity is dependent on general art. During the different periods of time the art has taken a void range of different forms and during the historical periods the artists have Sean is strong desire to engage via the physical and mental contexts of society and this issue have successfully gained when the artistic work has been connected with a specific place or event and has created the general art. The general art can be emerged in public spaces in different ways and forms such as the big and small statues, murals, paintings. public space furniture and ...., but in the meantime, along with the created charms by the general art, the social participation based on the cultural aspects of any public space under the influence of the different types of general art can make more people presented. the general art reliance in some way on interaction with the general public based on some common social ideas gives a very suitable opportunity for reviving these ideas and trying to revitalize the community and social relations. The need for human and vibrant environments in today's crowded cities is a need that has occupied the minds of all city officials including the urban designers, programmers and policy makers. The general art which is taken from and describes the historical narratives and holding ceremonies or periodic celebrations, simultaneously with the lighting of the elements in Water and Fire Park, have the greatest contribution in creating a democratic experienced by individuals which can be considered it equal among all kinds of arts in terms of value transmittal, and the simultaneous presence of all the arts is required. The arts mixed with conceptual metaphors and especial meanings are in the next stage and at last they are case arts.

In this article, the most important books on modern and contemporary art in Islamic lands were examined; these studies were divided into five categories: first, the books that studied the art of this region under the concept of “modern / contemporary Islamic art”, second, the books that studied under the title of “Middle Eastern Art”. Third, books that have followed Islamic art under the title “Arab Art”. Fourth, books that studied the Islamic art under nationalist narratives such as Iran, Arab, or Turkey art, and fifth, books under more general headings such as “Islamic Visual Culture” or Image Policy in Islamic Countries have been studied. Examining these resources is for three reasons: First, it enables researchers to compare approaches and methods in regional studies of Islamic art. Second, unfortunately, in Iran, there is not enough knowledge of the art of neighbors and other Islamic countries; therefore, reviewing the sources of regional art studies enables researchers to get acquainted with the most important sources and researchers in regional studies of art in Islamic countries. Third, by critically evaluating sixty important books in the study of modern and contemporary art in Islamic lands, we do emphasize the aspects that studies less than other aspects in this field were studied, and show the contribution of Iranian researchers in the regional studies of Islamic art.

Women artists from Muslim societies and Middle East are confronted with visual clichés of "being a woman", "being a Muslim" and "being a Middle Easterner". Art exhibitions and events welcome those art works that reproduce the stereotypes of re-Orientalism and Neo-Orientalism. After the September 11 attacks, the number of art exhibitions focusing on Middle Eastern women increased. This was an opportunity for women artists to bring their issues into the spotlight of the public attention and world's media; on the other hand, women were dealt with some hidden expectations and stereotypes which held by Western art events, that this events tending to direct artistic experiences towards the Western stereotypes. In this article, by methodological approach of "event studies", we review some of the most important art events for the Middle East; also we focus on two exhibitions "Breaking the Veils" (2002, Greece), and "She who tells a story" (2013, USA) which were held with the aim of rethinking stereotypes. The results showed that the works of women artists from Middle East can be categorized into a bipolar spectrum: from the image of women suffering from war, the repressed beauty of the Orient lands, the pitiful oppression of women, to the image of resilient and powerful women. At both ends of this spectrum, from passive victimized women to rioters and anti-tradition activists, there are diverse works that cover a wide range of themes. Women artists are looking for a way to both criticize the limitations of patriarchal culture and overcome the reductionistic and exotic expectations from women's art. This difficult path must be taken against the expectations held by the art market and political expectations from art exhibitions.

The question of the nature of religious cinema has had many answers, such as the Spiritual, Transcendental and Conceptual cinema and efforts have been made to study religious cinema such as style, genre, and type. Rather than presenting structural definitions of religious cinema, this article try to an inductive approach to determine the social and cultural perceptions of religious cinema in the context of films.Therefore, by studying films in “Rooyesh film: the festival of religious cinema” and examining 369 films based on the methodology of content analysis, the question has been answered: how is the representation of religion in the films of this festival? What aspects and feature of religion are depicted in the Rooyesh festival Movies?Also cultural and social developments in religious cinema have been studied by comparing study of the first festival (2005) with the 10th Rooyesh festival Movies (2016) and has been try to answer to this question: How has the representation of the results show that admirable depict of religion was replaced by questionable confrontation of religion. Also, the representation of rituals and ceremonies of religion has declined dramatically and non-traditional religious cinema has increased in Iranian cinema. Traditional and nostalgic depiction of religious cinema that emphasizes the inherent innocence (childishness, rural simplicity, pure naturalism) or restoration and preservation of traditions (traditional rituals, traditional occupations, traditional monuments, traditional arts). These narratives were replaced by critical and traumatic cinema.

Photographs are the most important medium for memories: as historical documents, images provide powerful sources for approaching events including the ones that took place in the past, and therefore become part of the collective and historical consciousness of a society. By adopting a photographic drama, the artist disrupts the linear structure of the official version of a historical narrative and turns the dualism of memory and oblivion as the subject of thought and social construction into a means of disclosure. By drawing attention to the significant events, power systems seek to make recall the memories of victories and powers and to obliterate the historical failures. That is why the critics of power emphasize on the history’s rifts. Whether by portraying the glorious achievements of a nation in pictures and film or by revoking the forgotten memories through their critical attitudes, the artists play an important role in both formation of memories and reconstruction of forgotten one. Historical movies, historical photography and historical paintings are part of this effort. This study looks into the ‘By an Eyewitness’ collection using discursive analysis, and aims to discover the changes of the background and their effects on formation of ruptures in collective memory.

Galleries are the meeting point of the values of the artistic and the market community; galleries accord the aesthetic values with the values of the market by determining the price of art works. This accordance is more important for emerging artists, as it can enable them to continue their activities. In this article, for studying the alignment and conflict between the values of the artistic community and the market community, the function of galleries and art fairs with consideration on their role in introducing emerging artists have been studied. Therefore, the concept of emerging artists has been addressed first; then the field study of the annual exhibition of ‘Haft Negah’ has been considered, and the role of this event in introducing the emerging artists into the Iranian art community has been critically evaluated. The methodology is based on a field study (in four periods 2012 to 2015) of ‘Haft Negah’ in which artists whose works have been sold at least in three periods were evaluated, and some of them were identified as emerging artists. The works of these emerging artists were evaluated by a group of referees (consisted of nine critics, gallery owners and artists). The research results showed that there is a great difference of opinion between the values of the art community activists and the beneficiaries of the Iran’s art market; In this market, some criteria such as innovation and novelty of the artist have the least importance (the lowest coefficient of influence in the regression model);

This study aims to answer the question that how the image of the poverty is constructed in the Iranian movies? In order to achieve the purpose, a movie, which have been selected by purposive sampling method and could have been a representative for a large groups of movies, have been analyzed through the "Semiotic Analysis" method and considering the “Barthes” theory of “Myth” and “Bauman”, “Baudrillard”, “Galbraith” analysis of poor in consumer society. Some of the results show that this movie tries to naturalize the inequality and maintain status quo by constructing the myth of “irrational poor”, myth of “ guilty poor” and myth of “Scary other poor”. These myths shift the blame on the poor and reduce the poverty to a psychological issue and make it historyless. This study aims to answer the question that how the image of the poverty is constructed in the Iranian movies? In order to achieve the purpose, a movie, which have been selected by purposive sampling method and could have been a representative for a large groups of movies, have been analyzed through the "Semiotic Analysis" method and considering the “Barthes” theory of “Myth” and “Bauman”, “Baudrillard”, “Galbraith” analysis of poor in consumer society. Some of the results show that this movie tries to naturalize the inequality and maintain status quo by constructing the myth of “irrational poor”, myth of “ guilty poor” and myth of “Scary other poor”. These myths shift the blame on the poor and reduce the poverty to a psychological issue and make it historyless.

The audience's perception of the work is the culmination of the contact's interaction in the art system in which the audience achieves its understanding by assessing the work. Before the process of interpretation, the paraphrasing of the work, readings are made: Reading means the discovery of hidden message effects. In an attempt to construct a coherent concept of the work, the audience chooses elements of the work and organizes in a coherent whole such as presenting the narrative of the work. Audiences have different receipts in dealing with artwork. The initial assumptions in the perception of the work create a framework in which the next contents are interpreted. It's interpretation lead to the perception and understanding of the work. Past experiences of the audience, level of education, and gender are effective in reading works. The act of perception always begins with the prior knowledge and we associate new thing with what we already knew. Accordingly, the research hypothesis is that the male have abstract approach and female have a concrete approach photo reading. In this paper, with the abstract/concrete reading, and at a level beyond the interpretive / paraphrasing discourse, the exposure of the audience with selected photographs from NioshaTavakolian, GoharDashti, Ehsan Bagheri and Creative Photography Magazine have been investigated. By examining variables such as gender and education in reading and interpreting the audience from the photo, one can differentiate their views into two levels of interpretive (abstract) reading and paraphrasing (concrete) reading. Since among different arts, photographs have become more popular among the general public than visual media, and it has been used as a measure of research variables. The research method is qualitative and is used to study and categorize readings using the focused interview and gender approach. First, the concepts of reading, interpretation, paraphrasing, and narration as readings are discussed, and then the differences between the views of female and male and their relation to the readings and narratives of the photo are referred to, and finally, the narratives are separated which obtained from Focused Interview. Considering that in the Iranian society, women and men have different living experiences, so their views and way of dealing with phenomena such as pictures are different. Education is also effective in interpreting and paraphrasing audiences. Women use readings more than men to interpret and paraphrase. Women and men used different tools and narratives. Women initially start with emotional words and phrases, such as addressing the subject's feelings of a photo, explaining the meaning of photographs in the form of emotional descriptions and even after finding meaning, in most cases, in order to better understand the narrative of the photo with the focus of emotional criteria, they use abstract concepts, in such a way, these emotional descriptions confirm their abstract descriptions. In contrast, the men, in the face of a photo, they first seek to discover the distinct symbols and semantic codes that appear in the external photo and then by creating the rational ratios between them, they try to discover the meaning and interpretation of the photo.

Oriental Camera written by Ali Behdad, is an attempt to transcend the s tructuralis t approach to Orientalism, which often interprets local and regional photographs in an ideological pathway and as second-rate editions in the reproduction of the European view, while the author tries to go beyond this reading and interpret the works of local and regional photographers unlike those taken by European touris ts and re-interpret them in their regional context. The book looks at photographs of photojournalis ts living and settled in the Middle Eas t while keeping an eye on the colonial functions of the photo - which is more visible in the photographs of European travelers taken of the Eas t and the commercial photographs produced for the European eye. This in comparison with local power and culture gains a different meaning and function; therefore, a collection of Qajar pictures of Iran is being examined. At the end of the book, there is also a reference to the reproduction of Orientalis t views in contemporary photography.

The” Man on a composite horse and elephant” Paintings of Safavid belong to the world- composite paintings class that the scholars have acknowledged for emerging and abundance of them in the 16th / 10th century. Despite the attractiveness, those works faced stagnation and changing concepts over the next following years. This research on the context of the theory of reflection attempts to explain the influence of society and the dominant ideology in the art works and analysis of the content of images and its adaptation to the Safavid society, the nature and function of the identity and function of the figurative compartments in those works and their role in society and the reflection of society on them. The most important achievements of this research are determining the present and absent groups in the community which is depicted in those works, extracting the main concept from encoding images including "Integrated and centralized governance" and "king as herder of ra’āyā", adjusting those concepts with the capabilities and defects of the ruling class ideology, having a critical look at the concepts and finally presenting reasons for the stagnation of their illustrations, such as reduction of the capacity of the early dynamic ideology and the wane of metaphors such as ”king as herder of ra’āyā”.