Philosophy of Power and the Mediation of Art:The Lasting Impressions of Artistic Intermediality from Seventeenth Century Persia to Present Shadieh Emami Mirmobiny
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Maine State Library Digital Maine Academic Research and Dissertations Maine State Library Special Collections 2018 Philosophy of Power and the Mediation of Art:The Lasting Impressions of Artistic Intermediality from Seventeenth Century Persia to Present Shadieh Emami Mirmobiny Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalmaine.com/academic PHILOSOPHY OF POWER AND THE MEDIATION OF ART: THE LASTING IMPRESSIONS OF ARTISTIC INTERMEDIALITY FROM SEVENTEENTH CENTURY PERSIA TO PRESENT Shadieh Emami Mirmobiny Submitted to the faculty of The Institute for Doctoral Studies in the Visual Arts in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree Doctor of Philosophy May, 2018 Accepted by the faculty of the Institute for Doctoral Studies in the Visual Arts in partial fulfillment of the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. COMMITTEE MEMBERS Committee Chair: Ali Anooshahr, Ph.D. Professor, Department of History University of California, Davis Committee Member: Christopher Yates, Ph.D. Assistant Professor of Philosophy, and Art Theory Institute for Doctoral Studies in the Visual Arts Committee Member: EL Putnam, Ph.D. Assistant Lecturer, Dublin School of Creative Arts Dublin Institute of Technology ii © 2018 Shadieh Emami Mirmobiny ALL RIGHTS RESERVED iii “Do we need a theory of power? Since a theory assumes a prior objectification, it cannot be asserted as a basis for analytical work. But this analytical work cannot proceed without an ongoing conceptualization. And this conceptualization implies critical thought—a constant checking.” — Foucault To my daughter Ariana, and the young generation of students in the Middle East in search of freedom. iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I owe a debt of gratitude to a number of people, without whose assistance and support this dissertation project would not have taken shape and would not have been successfully completed as it was. First, I would like to express my thanks to my dissertation director, Dr. Ali Anooshahr, whose knowledge and expertise were a guiding light throughout the writing process. His patience, as I worked through the difficulties of the research, allowed my work to flourish and unfold in an organic way that facilitated the intertextualization between the three fields—history, art history and philosophy—that I had undertaken in this study. This project had a challenging start; however, the advice I received at our preparation seminars at Brown University, particularly from Dr. George Smith and Dr. Simonetta Moro, as well as the critical feedback offered by my examination committee, were instrumental in bringing into focus what was most important in this project. My sincere thanks to Dr. Simonetta Moro, Dr. Chris Yates, and Dr. Michael Smith for raising the critical questions that helped me plan out this complex and difficult work. I would also like to express especial thanks to Dr. Michael Smith, under whose keen supervision I began this research. No research project can be successfully completed without the ability to promptly access the necessary sources. I am grateful to IDSVA librarian, Laura Graveline, whose outstanding support in finding some of the more difficult-to-find sources, crucial to my work, made the sleuthing part of the research more pleasurable. I would also like to thank Mr. Mehdi Hazeghazam from the Iranian-American community, who generously gave me access to his personal library of books in the Persian language, including the most recent published materials that were significant in bringing this project’s thesis thread to the present time. My heartfelt thanks to my fellow adventurers, cohort ‘12, particularly members of my study group, Gale Richardson and Deb Bouchette, for their presence and contributions that enriched our interactions with the material tremendously. I am especially grateful to Deb for the stimulating conversations and exchanges that kept me going and thinking when the challenges of my research slowed me down. And last, but certainly not least, I would like to thank my husband, Hossein Mirmobiny, for bringing to my attention a number of key exegetical texts that were most advantageous in this study. His continuous love and support sustained me throughout the entire course of study at IDSVA, and his encouragements made the hardships of becoming a student again, while taking care of the family and teaching, endurable. v ABSTRACT Shadieh Emami Mirmobiny PHILOSOPHY OF POWER AND THE MEDIATION OF ART: THE LASTING IMPRESSIONS OF ARTISTIC INTERMEDIALITY, FROM SEVENTEENTH CENTURY PERSIA TO PRESENT This is a phenomenological study of patriarchy through the examination of its genealogy as it relates to/parallels with the creative process. I argue patriarchy, while itself a product of human creativity, has artificially elevated itself to prominence, and as such, has dominated and shaped subjectivities to its own end. It has done so by undermining individuality necessary for establishing the foundation of a more democratic form of government in the region of the Middle East. In this democracy, a dynamic balance and equity is envisioned between the subject and community. Therefore, this study is concerned with the power of imagination, in the broad sense, encompassing all creative endeavors that shape the subject. It focuses on the relationship between subjecthood, freedom and the infusion of Neoplatonic ideas with iterations of Islamic principles manifested in art and philosophy serving patriarchy. This study is predicated on the idea that the exploration of art and subjectivity can uncover the hidden, implicit power relations between humans and the creative process, and it relies upon the philosophy of power to establish a theory that aims to reach beyond what Foucault developed. vi Further, it intends to highlight the issue of “gap” in general, and the gap in particular that existed between the major Islamic text/principles—a variation of the Platonic “gap”— and the ideas/actions that have unfolded to this day but have never been questioned. The objective of this study is to create a space in which the Middle East and the West, each through its “other,” can recognize the importance of the process of the formation and preservation of the individual within a collective subjectivity. Finally, this research through a new theory aims to make more visible the current movements underscoring the individual subjectivity in the Middle East and to work toward protecting and preserving individual rights. vii TABLE OF CONTENTS PREFACE .................................................................................................................................... 1 INTRODUCTION ........................................................................................................................ 11 CHAPTER ONE WHERE IS THE SUBJECT? ................................................................................. 32 Defining the Subject ......................................................................................................... 34 The Problem of Neoplatonic Philosophy .......................................................................... 38 The Philosophy of Translation .......................................................................................... 49 Contemporary Critical Conversations............................................................................... 53 CHAPTER TWO SUBJECTIVITY: INFORMED BY A LONG TRADITION OF PATRIARCHY ............... 68 A Genealogy of Patriarchy: Origins of Art, Alterity and State ......................................... 69 Prehistory, Myth and the Birth of Art ....................................................................72 Foundations of Misogyny from the Neolithic Cultures to Antiquity and Beyond 79 Emergence of Monotheism: Judaism, Christianity and Islam: Word, Image and Power . 85 Monotheism and Patriarchy ...................................................................................86 Patriarchy’s Image and Imagination ......................................................................93 Artificial Unities: From Antiquities to the Infusion of Neoplatonic Philosophy into Islamic Thoughts, Art, Mimesis, Purification and the State ............................................. 96 Patriarchy’s Artificial Unities: from Antiquity to Modern Times Imagined through Art ..........................................................................................................................98 Artistic Implications into the Present Time ...........................................................99 Monotheism and the Issue of the “Other:” Inner versus Outer alterity .......................... 101 The Role of “Islamic Philosophy” in Helping to Shape European Renaissance .103 The Space between the Individual and the Collective .........................................105 CHAPTER THREE THE EMERGENCE OF THE SAFAVIDS: THE PHILOSOPHICAL AND ARTISTIC AFFIRMATIONS....................................................................................................................... 109 The Origins of the Safavids: new patriarchy, new dominant iteration of Islam, new power techniques and the role of art in the ideological state apparatus ..................................... 112 Creativity as an Ideological State Apparatus .......................................................116 viii Neoplatonism and the Theorization for the New-Incoming Power – Ibn Arabi’s Influence on the Safavids ................................................................................................................ 117 Neoplatonism