The Social Position of Mural Art after the Revolution of Iran

Culture and Art

341
1 March 2023

Mural Art after the Revolution

In the continuity of the art of painting during the Revolution and its post-victory period, when political currents sought to promote their ideas and gain social and political positions, mural art became a prominent tool that was used by political groups and masses of people. In fact, at the beginning of the victory of the Revolution, when the power was distributed among political parties and currents, the mural also had this characteristic. Over time, with the support of revolutionary institutions, this art was organized and hence its contents and messages moved towards post-Revolution official-political interpretations as well as official slogans and goals.

During the decades after the Islamic Revolution, the mural, while maintaining the relationship with the power centers, moved from its closed and traditional areas to the squares and streets thereby generalizing its audiences to the general public. On the other hand, the thematic range of mural works became significantly diverse and also painting became an important and effective cultural tool for establishing communication and expressing a message.

During the above-mentioned period, mural art in Iran was supported by centers such as the Foundation of Martyrs and Veterans Affairs, the Basij units in governmental agencies and institutions, and mosques as social bases. This art was born when the pictures of martyrs were painted on the walls of the city and in the middle of the 2000s, its activities reached their peak.

By developing their works on the walls of the city, the artists and painters active in this movement were able to seriously affect the face of the city with their themes and messages. In this period, instead of the decorative and modern works that were common, paintings with revolutionary themes appeared, which were used to convey messages in the simplest manner.

Unlike the beginning of the Revolution, in the later periods, the process of changes in mural art was gradual and continuous that took place in accordance with cultural and social developments. Considering the important events that took place in the second decade of the Revolution, this decade should be considered one of the significant periods in the history of contemporary Iranian art. The different approaches of cultural activists in the first half of this decade compared to the second half are among the most important factors in the fruitfulness of this decade.

Picture 1: A Mural, Tehran

Picture 2: A Mural, U.S. Embassy in Tehran

At the same time, mural art after 1979 can be divided into three periods: “Revolution,” “Imposed War” and “post-war”. The third period, due to its duration, includes various approaches.

Mural Art during the Revolution (1979-1981)

After the victory of the Islamic Revolution, the mural emerged as a committed art and despite the weakness of technical methods, which was caused by the activity of young and less experienced artists, sought to promote and strengthen the revolutionary principles and values by establishing them in society.

The whole art of painting in this period was influenced by the Revolution. What gives the painting of the Revolution a special identity and distinguishes it from that of before the Revolution and also from the new painting of the West, lies in the field of subjects and topics; despite the fact that these subjects exist in the history of painting in Iran and the West and the previous painters dealt with them, the attitude of the revolutionary painters towards these subjects and themes is different from that of the artists before the Revolution as well as their Western counterparts.

These works, as in the past, displayed their attitudinal-visual principles by choosing them from a variety of methods of expression in painting styles and forms of artistic trends of countries which had a similar situation to the Iranian Revolution. In the visual structure of these works, special forms and symbolic political, religious and cultural elements were used more than anything else. In this period, images such as the Holy Qur’an, Imam of the nation, clenched fists (as a sign of struggle), hands tied together (as a sign of popular unity), Uncle Sam, the American flag, the eagle (as a symbol of American colonialism), and the image of the Shah (showing the fall of the tyrant), were used as the main elements of the mural works. (Pictures 1 & 2).

Mural works after the Revolution created by non-scientific and non-professional groups – at the time of the emergence of the popular movements before the victory of the Revolution and also afterwards until the establishment of the system – can be classified into the following three forms in terms of image structure and aesthetics:

A) Pictorial: A combination of pictures of Imam Khomeini (RA) and a caricature of the Shah and other pictorial elements such as fists, weapons, tulips and blood, which were drawn or painted directly, or by using methods such as stenciling a combination of pictures and paintings, were depicted on the walls.

B) Writing: It was formed by the combination of brief and classic manuscripts of revolutionary slogans and messages of the leader of the Islamic Revolution. Different messages were written on top of each other in different ways in black, red or green colours.

C) Composite: Works that were created from the combination of painted, collaged, stenciled, and popular manuscripts during the Revolution.

Depicting what was happening requires a special expression such that each artist chose a method and technique to express these themes according to his own artistic tendency. The main weakness of the mural works of the first years of the Revolution until the outbreak of the war lies in the lack of recognition of the importance of the new language in contemporary painting and its application in the themes of the works. However, painters in the first years of the Revolution, regardless of techniques and methods, started designing and producing mural works with revolutionary and religious themes.

Hannibal Alkhas was among the well-known figures and painters who painted murals. He may be considered one of the designers of protest movements in the art of the Revolution. Certainly, his relationship with Jalal Al-e Ahmad influenced the emergence of these movements.

The painting on a wall in the south of Tehran was a special work that Hannibal Alkhas did with the help of his students. Another of his works was performed on the wall of the American Embassy. Both works had labor and anti-colonial themes. Other works of this artist were performed together with Niloufar Qaderinejad and Masoud Sa’doddin at the College of Fine Arts (Pictures 3 & 4).

Picture 3: A Mural Created by Hannibal Alkhas, Niloufar Qaderinejad and Masoud Sa’doddin

Picture 4: A Mural Created by Hannibal Alkhas, Niloufar Qaderinejad and Masoud Sa’doddin

Picture 5: A Mural, War Period

With a tendency towards some kind of narrative and mythological themes and belief that was desirable at the time, Hannibal Alkhas introduced artists such as Niloufar Qaderinejad, Bahram Dabiri, Nosratollah Moslemian, Masoud Sa’doddin, Naser Palangi and Adham Zargham to the society.

Picture 6: A Mural, War Period

Picture 7: A Mural, War Period

The first decade of the Revolution coincided with [Iraq’s] invasion of Iran which resulted in an unwanted war that lasted for eight years. Most of the art works in this era were affected by this event and its different angles were depicted. Thus, the field of Islamic thought and art as one of the political currents after the Revolution became a focal point to accompany the Islamic Revolution in artistic fields.

During the Imposed War, artists and painters, together with the people, engaged in the art of resistance against aggression. The rapid movements of the Revolution and the political events in the world in addition to their effects on the people of Iran in the eight-year war caused artists to create works appropriate to the period of Sacred Defence.

Picture 8: A Mural Created by Iraj Eskandari, War Period

The works of this period mainly sought to promote the spirit of martyrdom, commemorate the sacrifices of warriors and establish a link between the values of the Islamic Revolution and the Sacred Defence and the role of the arrogant powers in the war (Picture 8). Also, there was a combination of themes of Revolution and war in some works created during the war (Picture 9).

Picture 9: A Mural Created by Niloufar Qaderinejad and Nasrin Afrooz, War

The main theme of the murals created during the war period, which addressed the subject of war and related concepts, were the images of warriors and martyrs combined with religious pictorial elements, the necessities of war, and popular symbols of this period (Pictures 10-14).

Picture 10: A Mural, War Period

Picture 11: A Mural, War Period

The honorable status of martyrs has made artists acknowledge the need to pay attention to and emphasize the sacrifices of martyrs in artworks, yet some artists believe that the mural works with the theme of martyrs need to be improved in terms of quality and theme, and only depicting the faces of martyrs would limit the value and artistic content of these works.

In the meantime, there were also works that expressed the concepts of martyrdom and ascension in symbolic combinations and also avoided the direct use of martyrs’ faces (Pictures 15 & 16).

Picture 12: A Mural, War Period

Picture 13: A Mural, War Period

Picture 14: A Mural, War Period

Picture 15: A Mural, War Period

Mural Works in the Period after the Imposed War

This period of mural art, which itself is undergoing evolution and gradual changes, has undergone an evolutionary process in terms of theme and content, semiotic system, functions and goals of production, and other surrounding elements, in parallel with the social developments of its time. Also, it can be divided into shorter time periods.

Picture 16: A Mural, War Period

Picture 17: A Mural

Picture 18: A Mural

After the Imposed War, the first years of which were called the period of construction, the painters of the Revolution continued working in the field of Mural Art in accordance with Islamic thought, and gradually municipalities began supporting and managing such works. The pictures on these walls were mostly decorative and contained messages related to the preservation of the environment with elements such as flowers and chickens, nature and landscape. By the end of the war, the spontaneous role of the people in painting on the walls, which was formed according to having a sense of responsibility, faded and was even eliminated. In the first years after the war, due to the lack of precise planning, different organizations were active in the field of mural works.

Picture 19: A Mural, Post-War Period

Picture 20: A Mural, Post-War Period

Beautification Organization of the Municipality of Tehran, the Foundation of Martyrs and Veterans Affairs, Islamic Propagation Organization, the Cultural and Art Department of Municipality of Tehran, Tehran City Metro Company and cultural departments of some military institutions became involved in urban mural works. Meanwhile, Beautification Organization of the Municipality of Tehran and the Foundation of Martyrs and Veterans Affairs played a key role in the development of Mural Art in these years. Each of these organizations followed its own approach in this field according to its organizational duties. Generally, these approaches include decorative mural works and landscape painting; wall writing; and painting pictures of the martyrs on walls.

Picture 21: A Mural, Post-War Period

Picture 22: A Mural, Post-War Period

Using the pictures of martyrs in the mural works that were created during the war continued after the war as well, and more creative works appeared with new combinations and a pleasing atmosphere. This group of works is usually designed with the aim of introducing the martyrs of the Imposed War (Pictures 17-19). Paying attention to the symbols related to war and martyrdom is still the focus of many works created in this period.

Most of the pictures of this period are enlarged paintings of natural landscapes, which would never connect to their visual and conceptual environment. On the other hand, one of the factors that undermine such works is the lack of necessary coordination between them and the surrounding environment, to the extent that in some cases these images disturb the harmony of the urban space.

During these works, significant mural works have also been created by well-known artists, which sometimes were in line with the works related to the Revolution and war in order to express the ideology of the Revolution (Picture 23) and sometimes by emphasizing their cultural content, which is based on literature, culture, art and religion, have become significant, interesting and influential. The performance of these works started in the early 1990s in Tehran (Pictures 24 & 25). Furthermore, the works with the theme of cultural events and approaches could be categorized as such.

Among the active painters in the field of mural works, Masoud Arabshahi, who turned to abstract embossed works, created numerous murals inside and outside the country.