"In addition to his numerous pictures of urban life and portraits made in his famous studio in Tehran, Sevruguin made a photographic inventory of the landscape, archaeological sites, and people of Azarbaijan and continued the project in Kurdistan and Luristan (in southwestern Iran)."--BOOK JACKET. "In this generously illustrated book, the first ever devoted to Sevruguin and his singular work, six distinguished authors explore the photographer's life and career."--BOOK JACKET.
-This catalogue accompanies the exhibition Technologies of the Image: Art in 19th-Century Iran, on view at the Harvard Art Museums, Cambridge, Massachusetts, from August 26, 2017 through January 7, 2018.-
Eva Baer, The Illustrations for an Early Manuscript of Ibn Butlan's "Da'wat al-A?ibb?' in the L.A. Mayer Memorial in Jerusalem Anthony Welch, Hussein Keshani, and Alexandra Bain, Epigraphs, Scripture, and Architecture in the Early Sultanate of Delhi David J. Roxburgh, Persian Drawing, ca. 1400-1450: Materials and Creative Procedures R.D. McChesney, Architecture and Narrative: The Khwaja Abu Nasr Parsa Shrine. Part 2: Representing the Complex in Word and Image, 1696-1998 Machiel Kiel, The Quatrefoil Plan in Ottoman Architecture Reconsidered in the Light of the "Fethiye Mosque" of Athens Shirine Hamadeh, Splash and Spectacle: The Obsession with Fountains in Eighteenth-Century Istanbul Willem Floor, The Talar-i Tavila or Hall of Stables, a Forgotten Safavid Palace Brian L. McLaren, The Italian Colonial Appropriation of Indigenous North African Vernacular Architecture in the 1930's Jeffrey B. Spurr, Person and Place: The Construction of Ronald Graham's Persian Photo Album
"In this generously illustrated book, the first ever devoted to Sevruguin and his singular work, six distinguished authors explore the photographer's life and career."--Jacket.
Explore the changing world of late nineteenth-century Iran through the gaze of one of its most renowned photographers, Antoin Sevruguin. This volume, which will be accompanied by a forthcoming exhibition, publishes for the first time the Oriental Institute Museums complete collection of nineteenth-century Iranian photographs, most of which were created by Sevruguin. Sevruguins artfully staged photographs still resonate with us today. Accompanying the print catalog is a series of essays that investigate Sevruguins life and photographic career, including the lasting impact of his unique vision, as demonstrated by the work of contemporary artist Yassaman Ameri.
Through photographs we preserve the past, and looking for the past is the very job of the archaeologist. But what are we looking at in an archaeological photograph? Archaeological photography is often largely deserted, to be scanned with a forensic gaze, towards finding evidence of what once took place. At the same time, photographs of excavated sites and artefacts have revealed stunning ancient works, shot as works of art. In Photography and Archaeology, Frederick Bohrer examines some of history's most famous archaeological excavations, as well as lesser-known and previously unpublished finds, from the Mediterranean, Middle East, Asia, Europe and the Americas, and the ways these sites have been represented in photographs. Bohrer shows how the development of photography in the nineteenth century made archaeology available to a much wider audience, and he discusses how these images revealed the material traces of the past, as well as their meaning and use today. Spanning the dual histories of both photography and archaeology, the book makes evident how what we know of the archaeological past has always been related to how it has been photographically represented and circulated: in scholarly papers, popular accounts, scientific archives, museum catalogues and numerous other formats. Bohrer concludes that such images possess contending, if not mutually exclusive, properties. While photography seems to guarantee documentary objectivity, at the same time it also fundamentally alters the archaeological object, transforming it into a work of art. Along the way, he discusses archaeological examples and images by photographers including Maxime du Camp, Francis Frith, John Beazley Greene, Ernst Herzfeld and others, to more contemporary photographers such as Aaron Levin, Roger Wood and Marilyn Bridges. Beautifully illustrated with fine archaeological images, many published here for the first time, Photography and Archaeology will be of interest to archaeologists, art historians and photographers, as well as anyone concerned with, or captivated by, archaeology's ongoing engagement with the past.--
The historiography of early photography has scarcely examined Islamic countries in the Near and Middle East, although the new technique was adopted very quickly there by the 1840s. Which regional, local, and global aspects can be made evident? What role did autochthonous image and art traditions have, and which specific functions did photography meet since its introduction? This collective volume deals with examples from Iran, the Ottoman Empire, and the Arab lands and with the question of local specifics, or an „indigenous lens." The contributions broach the issues of regional histories of photography, local photographers, specific themes and practices, and historical collections in these countries. They offer, for the first time in book form, a cross-section through a developing field of the history of photography.
Historiography is the study of the methodology of writing history, the development of the discipline of history, and the changing interpretations of historical events in the works of individual historians. Exploring the historiography of Persian art and architecture requires a closer look at a diverse range of sources, including chronicles, historical accounts, travelogues, and material evidence coming from archaeological excavations. The Historiography of Persian Architecture highlights the political, cultural, and intellectual contexts that lie behind the written history of Persian architecture in the twentieth century, presenting a series of investigations on issues related to historiography. This book addresses the challenges, complexities, and contradictions regarding historical and geographical diversity of Persian architecture, including issues lacking in the 20th century historiography of Iran and neighbouring countries. This book not only illustrates different trends in Persian architecture but also clarifies changing notions of research in this field. Aiming to introduce new tools of analysis, the book offers fresh insights into the discipline, supported by historical documents, archaeological data, treatises, and visual materials. It brings together well-established and emerging scholars from a broad range of academic spheres, in order to question and challenge pre-existing historiographical frameworks, particularly through specific case studies. Overall, it provides a valuable contribution to the study of Persian architecture, simultaneously revisiting past literature and advancing new approaches. This book would be of interest to students and scholars of Middle East and Iranian Studies, as well as Architectural History, including Islamic architecture and historiography.
