Tehran Squares Sculpture of Figurative Totalitarianism to Abstract Individualism

Document Type : Review

Authors

1 Ph.D candidate in Art research, Alzahra University, Faculty member of NAZAR research center

2 , M.A. in Landscape Architecture, University of Tehran

3 M.A. in Landscape Architecture, University of Tehran

Abstract

Urban sculpture, by leaving the monopoly of museums and galleries, has been put into the urban perspective to help the readability of the city, and also to play a role in improving the visual quality. In this regard, taking into account the mentality of observer, history and context, are known as the most important principles to achieve the above objectives.
It seems that the presence of sculptures in Tehran squares from the first Pahlavi era to the present time has developed a process from figurative authoritarianism to the abstract individualism that contains a dialectical contradiction. So that the authority of the state, in the first and second Pahlavi dynasty reflected in the realistic representation of the figures and from the 80s to today, taking a cue from the aesthetics of modernist follows an abstract and individualistic approach. So it might be said that the squares sculpture, as an urban landmark, by being separated from the context and history and ignoring the observer, has not come through the evolutionary process imbedded in symbol-making but with up-taking the abstractionism, has taken distance from giving meaning to the environment. In neither of these two approaches, the square sculpture does not retrieve its placement as an urban art representing an observer-centered art, and in place of a decorative object, the symbolic role of it has even faded due to the lack of attention to the context it has been placed in and the history associated with it.
Sculptures in their evolutionary process influenced by extreme modernism, rather than becoming a symbol, have reached to abstraction, so that the impression of symbol is not expected of them. In this regard, locating the sculptures of symposia and special biennales in the city squares that are not context oriented and formed based on the artist's mental frameworks has led to this problem. In general, urban sculpture, as a social issue should not be under the sovereignty of the individual sculptor, but instead it is required to reflect the social character and identity of the city to be able to improve the quality of urban landscape.

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