The Visual Arts of the Middle East after 1800 in Cross-Cultural Perspective

Dear Colleagues,

Although long excluded from the canon, modern and contemporary art and architecture in the Middle East (broadly understood) have gained increased attention in recent decades. The discussions on the taxonomies inherited from the nineteenth century for the definition of the field (Arab? Muslim? Islamic? Middle Eastern?), or the role of religion and faith in its developments, have paved the way for a greater inclusion of the full range of artworks produced in the region since 1800. New media, such as photography, craft, and graphic design, have been gradually incorporated in the research agenda. In-depth historical enquiries have been conducted on specific pictorial movements such as surrealism, calligraphism, and abstraction; Islamic style and vernacular modernism in architecture have received their share of scholarship. Looking beyond creation and patronage, work on technology, reception and consumption, stirred innovative approaches, and revealed significant moments, among which transcultural Qajar Iran. However, the colonial paradigm on the one hand, and that of nation-building on the other, still represent the main lenses through which the arts of the region after 1800 are seized and interpreted. Analysis in terms of dominance of, or submission to, the West, and of nationalist resistance to external forces, continue to loom large, to the detriment of the myriad contact zones, international polarities, multilateral agencies, and cross-cultural interactions that were no less impacting. There is a need to better comprehend the “middle ground” that vernacular modernities of cosmopolitan nature, national art worlds with global connections, and expatriate milieus with local loyalties contributed to instigate. It participated in fostering and promoting art in the region during the past two centuries by bringing together people, visual cultures, and technologies of distinct origins and convictions, not to mention subjectivities.

Against this historiographical background, the present Special Issue opts to centre on historical instances of connectedness and transculturality. It is devoted to the cross-cultural circulations, interactions and mediations taking place after 1800 in the field of Middle Eastern arts inclusively envisioned. Topics of interest for evidence-based essays may include but are not limited to:

• The critical reception and popular appropriation of photography and canvas painting, as seized through writing, artistic practice, interior fashioning, and art collecting;
• Artistic education and educators, in and out of the region;
• Remediation (the recycling of established traditions in modern and contemporary artistic practice) and intermediacy (i.e., the recasting of photography in painting, or of manuscript illumination in the decorative arts);
• Invented traditions in architecture and handicraft;
• Public and private transnational patronage, through galleries, exhibitions, biennales, museums, and cultural organisations;
• The rise and impact of specialised art markets.

Prof. Dr. Mercedes Volait
Guest Editor

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• Visual Arts
• Middle East