ICON-FORM: THE DIFFERENTIAL LOGIC OF ANICONISM IN ISLAMIC TRADITION A THESIS SUBMITTED TO THE DEPARTMENT OF GRAPHIC DESIGN AND THE INSTITUE OF FINE ARTS OF BİLKENT UNIVERSITY IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF FINE ARTS BY NUH YILMAZ AUGUST, 2001 I certify that I have read this thesis and that in my opinion it is fully adequate, in scope and in quality, as a thesis for the degree of Master of Fine Arts. Assist. Prof. Dr. Mahmut Mutman (Supervisor) I certify that I have read this thesis and that in my opinion it is fully adequate, in scope and in quality, as a thesis for the degree of Master of Fine Arts. Assist. Prof. Dr. Halil Nalçaoğlu I certify that I have read this thesis and that in my opinion it is fully adequate, in scope and in quality, as a thesis for the degree of Master of Fine Arts. Assist. Prof. Dr. Çetin Sarıkartal Approved by the Institute of Fine Arts Prof. Dr. Bülent Özgüç Director of the Institute of Fine Arts ii ABSTRACT ICON-FORM: THE DIFFERENTIAL LOGIC OF ANICONISM IN ISLAMIC TRADITION Nuh Yılmaz M.F.A. in Graphic Design Supervisor: Assist. Prof. Dr. Mahmut Mutman August, 2001 This study aims to analyse the perception of the icons and figural representation in the Islamic tradition in the framework of fetishism. Following debates of fetishism, a new concept, icon-form will be proposed in order to understand the situation of icons in Islam. After that this concept, icon-form will be tested in the case of calligraphy. This may lead to a different approach to the Islamic economy of vision. Key Words: Icon-form, fetishism, calligraphy, icon, figural representation, discourse, figure, and mimesis. iii ÖZET İKON-BİÇİM: İSLAMİ GELENEKTE İKONSUZLUĞUN FARKA DAYALI MANTIĞI Nuh Yılmaz Grafik Tasarım Bölümü Yüksek Lisans Tez Yöneticisi: Assist. Prof. Dr. Mahmut Mutman August, 2001 Bu çalışma, İslam geleneği içinde ikonların ve figüre dayalı temsil biçimlerinin algılanmasını fetişizm çerçevesinde incelemeyi amaçlıyor. Fetişizm tartışmaları takip edilerek, ikonların durumunu anlamak üzere yeni bir kavram, ikon-biçim öneriliyor. Sonrasında bu kavram hat sanatı örneğinde sınanıyor. Böylelikle İslami görüş ekonomisine farklı bir yaklaşım deneniyor. Anahtar Kelimeler: İkon-biçim, fetişizm, hat, ikon, figüre dayalı temsil, söylem, figür ve öykünme. iv for Zehra Yağmur, because of her question “Daddy did your thesis finish?” v ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I would like to thank my supervisor, Assist. Prof. Dr. Mahmut Mutman who encouraged me to write on this topic. This thesis would not have been possible without him and his guidance. I would also like to thank Assist. Prof. Dr. Çetin Sarıkartal who shared his all material with me. I also wish to express my thanks to Zeynep Sayın who helped me by her writings and dialogs. I must acknowledge here all my instructors Assist. Prof. Dr. Nezih Erdoğan, Assist. Prof. Dr. Lewis Keir Johnson and Zafer Aracagök. I would like to thank to my wife İsmihan, because of her continuous support. She helped me both by her ‘presence and absence’. My special thanks are due Hamza, Hatem, Cemo, Ertan and Aziz for their helps. Finally, I also wish to express my thanks to the basic design students. Although they do not know, I felt me great because of their limitless energy. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT………………………………………………………………………………………..iii ÖZET……………………………………………………………………………………………….iv ACKNOWLEDGMENTS…………………………………………………………..……………vi TABLE OF CONTENTS……………………………………………………………………….vii 1. INTRODUCTION...............................................................................1 2. ICON-FORM: THE STATUS OF ICONS AND FIGURAL REPRESENTATION IN ISLAM ............................................................................................5 2.1. FREUD’S CONCEPTUALISATION OF FETISH .................................5 2.2. MARX’ CONCEPTUALISATION OF COMMODITY FETISHISM ...........7 2.3. REEVALUATING MARX AND FREUD: ŽIŽEK.................................12 2.4. THE IMPORTANCE OF SIGN-FORM: BAUDRILLARD.....................14 2.5. A NEW CONCEPT FOR UNDERSTANDING THE PROHIBITION OF ICONS IN ISLAM: ICON-FORM.........................................................18 2.6. IS ANICONISM ENOUGH? .........................................................21 2.7. ICON-FORM.............................................................................25 3. CALLIGRAPHY AS A SOLUTION FOR THE ICON-FORM.......................29 3.1. CALLIGRAPHY AS AN ISLAMIC ART ...........................................29 3.2. IN THE ABSENCE OF THE FACE OF THE UNSEEN........................41 3.3. TRACKING THE FOOTSTEP OF JUDAISM....................................47 3.4. VISION IN THE CROSSROAD OF DISCOURSE AND FIGURE .........54 3.5. FISCOURSE, DIGURE................................................................56 3.5. PLASTICITY OF THE LETTER: SINGULARITY IN LANGUAGE.........65 3.6. IMITATIO VERSUS MIMESIS .....................................................69 3.7. CALLIGRAPHY AS OBJET a........................................................71 4. CONCLUSION ................................................................................85 WORKS CITED...................................................................................89 vii 1. INTRODUCTION This study aims to analyse the perception of the icons and figural representation in the Islamic tradition, in doing so, it will show how the conventional wisdom about figural representations or icons is unable to explain the complicated structure of icons. Hence, this thesis, particularly, maintains that unless an alternative perspective is developed based on an idea of icon-form, the major shortcomings in delineating the issue is going to persist. This analysis does not cover the historical development of icons or figural representation, instead it endeavours to locate these debates in a theoretical framework with following some important figures such as Freud, Marx, Žižek and Baudrillard. In the first chapter, I initially will focus on the problem of fetishism and the primacy of form in any systemic structure in order to propose a new concept, icon-form. Conceptualisation of fetishism helps us to understand the break in people’s beliefs and practical lives. The answer of the question why people does not behave the way they believe could be best understood by the concept of fetishism. In fetishism the logic of ‘as if’ determines the behaviour of people. Having analysed fetishism, the distinction between use value and exchange value will be analysed in the light of form. In any structure, this distinction collapses, instead, the value of object is determined differentially. This differential determination of value gives priority to the form not the content, like commodity-form and sign-form. Thus, in order to analyse the status of icons, by criticising the two mainstream approaches, one is defended by Grabar and Allen who argue that there is no prohibition of icons or figural representation in Islam, and the other that is defended by Islamic Orthodoxy advocates that there is a strict prohibition of icons or figural representations, I will propose the concept of icon-form. These two different ideas are both correct and incorrect because of the similarity of their theoretical grounds. Both share the same metaphysical background, privileging the meaning over form in distinction between form and content. Hence, form is taken as accidental and supplementary in both approaches. Using the concept of icon-form, I firstly 2 tried to reconcile the totally different arguments, and then to display their blind spot that stems from their negligence of the importance of form. In the second chapter, I take the calligraphy as an Islamic art form in which icon-form works well and as an art that cannot be analysed by those two approaches. The genesis of the calligraphy indicates the avoidance from figural representation from one perspective, which is at the same time nourished by Islamic Orthodoxy. On the other hand, because of its undecidable character, calligraphy can be seen as an example of figural representation that supports the other approaches outside Islamic Orthodoxy. However, highlighting the ideas of Hamid Dabashi and Lyotard, the relation between Islamic understanding of images and Judaism is exhibited. Analysing the historical construction of vision and visuality, this thesis will, mainly, delineate the particularity of the Islamic economy of vision. Nevertheless, these explications are not enough to understand of the nature of calligraphy from the angle of icon-form. Therefore, I have argued the borders of figure and discourse in reference to Lyotard. In the end, the concurrent ideas between Lyotard and Ibn Arabi support this ambiguous relation 3 between figure and discourse and the singular character of writing. Lastly, the singularity of the Islamic vision stems from its different construction of representation, that could be defined as mimesis according to Zeynep Sayın. To sum up, calligraphy is the crux of the problem of figural representation in Islam. As a non-signifying signifier, calligraphy threads the problem of representation. While it signifies itself, it attempts to show the Absence of Face of the Unseen. Ultimately it is an objet a, which cannot satisfy the will to see, but it shows the eternal lack by showing itself. There is a powerful regime of representation, which shows the absence and the presence of the Face of the Unseen at the same time that indicates both prohibition of the figural representation and the legitimate status of figural representation.