Reflections of Iranshahri Discourse on Murals of the Qajar School "Case Study: The Themes of the Championship in Mural Painting of Fath-Ali Shah’s

The emergence of Iranshahri ideas and attention to ancient and national themes in the first period of the Qajar School, give rise to an image which roots are traced back to the identity of Iranian history and the aura behind the Aryan essence of Iranian religious, epic and mythological texts. Qajar School of thought, as a state-national discourse, along with two other Islamic-Shia discourses and modernity, draws on visual reminders rooted in Iranian heroic and mythical themes; for every work of art or essentially any kind of cultural object is comprehensible in relation to the institutional structure of the society in which it is produced and received, based on its position and function, and certainly within it. Therefore, the Qajar murals and their relation to the ​​Iranshahri idea should be explored in the context of society and its government in particular. The murals of the Qajar School, as a state and national media, reflect the dominant thought and discourse of this period. The use of visual themes and objects with direct and indirect references to ancient history reflects a consistent paradigm that adapts to the epistemic system of Iranian art in particular epochs and emerges in the propaganda arena of society. Qajar masonry with developmental growth during Fath-Ali Shah, builds on several themes and visual subjects. There are a variety of subjects ranging from decorative, rhythmic, martial and religious to natural and artificial landscapes, archeology, historiography, masonry and even trilogy.
But the purpose of this research is to study the visual form of themes that, for direct political and cultural validity and legitimacy of the government, directly and indirectly refer to the concept of Iranshahri, prince and archeology, and the heroic and national patterns that in Iranian thought are symbols of Shahnameh. The wall space was used as a propaganda ground for political discourse of the period. To this end, the main research questions are as follows: why the Iranian thought as a Qajar-centered idea in public spaces emerged, and why and how this idea appeared in murals with heroic themes as a form of discourse, and how it has changed following the elimination of this thought. In the meantime, the themes of heroism and ancient heroism are studied with Shahnameh images as a case study and statistical population, since Ferdowsi as the force behind survival and renewal of Iranian nationality and the national unity of the Iranians recounts Iranian pre-Islamic stories and tales in Shahnameh, in which Rostam’s central heroism as the legendary hero who links the court of kings with popular culture, creates the interface between the private and inner courtyards of the palace on one hand and the public square of the city on the other hand.
Studies show that Iranshahri discourse as a continuous conceptual thought in Iranian history is not born again, but recalled. This discourse, in the critical moments of Iranian history that needed the epistemic system of nationalism, is fueled by two spectrums of power for legitimacy and survival, and society through the idea of ​​divinity and the belief in a good substitute force that reflects in visual expression. It manifests itself. Qajar-era discourse along with two traditional and modern discourses of intellectual development are preceded by visual developments, but the Qajar-era discourse of Fath-Ali shah which can be considered as continuation of the Khosravani tradition, the epistemic system of ancient Iranian thought, and the spirit of Aryan ideology, inspired by the Shahnameh of the community, is embedded in a long-lived tradition that is very different from the second period of Naser al-Din Shah's reign. For this reason, Fath-Ali Shah is considered to be a traditional legatee who has been familiar with the political ideas of the state from the previous era on which he emphasized.
One of the manifestations of Iranshahri thought in Ferdowsi's Shahnameh and the legendary hero's thought is to continue in the visual tradition of Iran with two types of murals and book-making. Fath-Ali Shah's role as a legendary hero in the face of evil in the Qajar mural tradition, in addition to a propaganda tool, is a reminder of an old but continuing tradition that, considering the advent of modern ideas and the Eastern-Western epistemic system, is different from the past and modern. It is depicted with a continuing tradition. In the first period of the Qajar dynasty, Rostam, as a mythical prince in the urban context, and in particular the gates and entrances, bears the burden of the king's sense of unity in the diversity of all ethnic groups, and in the pursuit of this unity he constantly fights against enemies. Yet Rostam's icon in the second period is not an ideal king, but a powerful hero who is bred with a powerful arm to fight the wars and ultimately defeat the enemies.