Typology of Line and Form in the Pattern of Bismillah Bird (Case Study of Professor Reza Mafi’s Work)

The application of script in the Islamic art, as in architecture, cloth designing and other applied arts, shows that Farsi script, apart from conveyance of concept, is being used as a decorative and symbolic element, as it has harmonic complexities and opportune visual ups and downs. In the 40s S.H. and creation of Saqakhane school, the artists who were concerned with guarding and further developing the national art, were seduced by a novel style called drawing - calligraphy; the so-called style is based on illustration of form-based aesthetics of the script and also, it became a sole decorative element, using other elements of drawing. The latter led to eventual salvation of the script apart from conveyance of concept. There were also artists who tried to revive and revitalize an old Islamic art, which was named “script drawing”, that had been underlined during the Safavid and the Qajar periods; an art form in which recreation of conceptual forms is being made by using the script. In this regard, images of holy animals are created using decorative scripts. One of the most important pieces is a bird-formed Bismillah (In the name of god) script. In the Islamic culture, birds have a special place. The birds are used to found and mean visual terrestrial elements again, proportional to religious definitions; regarding both the form and concept.
Furthermore, writing the Islamic name for God, the Prophet’s name, verses of Qoran like La -ela-ha-ella-Allah (which means there is no god but Allah) has frequently been done by different artists. The writing of Bismillah (which is Arabic for “In the name of God, the most merciful and the most compassionate”) is one of the most frequently used phrases between Muslim artists due to its high religious value and credit as well as its meaning.
 By arrival of Islam and its prohibition of drawing, artists always tried to implement symbolic and virtual forms in their works. This thought led to arts based on environmental and natural forms, such as Esllimi (arabesque) forms used in architecture, and Toranj and Lachak in carpets as well as other related simplifications. In recent years, regarding the lack of basic definitions in this regard, no distinguished artistic creation has happened; this is also because of the lack of dominance in terms of skills of decorative script’s different branches. Research around this subject will lead to historical recreations of evolutional path of work creation, which eventually leads to creation of creative works based on knowledge around traditions. The current survey is aimed at knowing script drawing and its distinction with drawing – calligraphy. Accumulation of so-called structured knowledge is considered to ease the creation of deliberate arts between young artists. The current survey is undertaken due to the urgency of disclosing differences between basic definitions of script drawing and drawing-calligraphy and their fundamental differences, focusing on bird of Bismillah drawn by Reza Mafi. Reza Mafi is a leading Saqakhane school artist who implemented script in drawing images, and has created most works among contemporary artists around bird of Bismillah. Questions of the survey are: 1- What are the concepts of the script and image in bird of Bismillah regarding visual symbolism? 2- What are the mostly used techniques and scripts in works named as bird of Bismillah? 3- How are forms, which are implemented in the latter works, categorized regarding visual symbolism? The survey method is library-based; based on available documentations that are gathered using fiche method and categorizing tables.
 The statistical population consists of artists of the 30s and the 40s S.H. of Saqakhane school followers. The samples include 4 works by Mafi, and 4 other birds of Bismillah from other Safavid and Qajar-era art pieces. The sampling is not random and is based on previous authorized samples that confirm the identity of the artist. Among these 8 art pieces, Mafi’s works are regarded with considering visual symbolism based on explicit and implicit indicating signs. It is found out that birds of Bismillah are among religious artistic works. Both in the Safavid and the Qajar eras, artists of Saqakhane School had enhanced their religious credit by drawing bird of Bismillah and subsequent praise and worship of the unity Allah. These forms are generally drawn using the problematic script of Thuluth (and sometimes Nastaliq). According to the investigated works (symbolic images of bird, drawing of Bismillah to create images) the form of lines and images are drawn alike symbols and meaningful forms, in spite of script drawing in which words are made void of their meanings, and as the form and color elements are superior and words and letters play only aesthetic roles, words in script drawing are used controversially, and the element of script has the main visual role.