a discourse analysis of the middle east art

this study aims at the analysis of the discourse of the art in the middle east. therefore, at the first stage, after criticizing the limitations of the theory of style in the modern art analysis, we emphasize discourse analysis as an alternative approach; at the second stage, we apply discourse approach in order to analyze the art in the middle east. the discourse analysis of art consists, at one level, of the visual characteristics of the text and its genre, and, at a higher level, of intertextual interpretation of the text and its relation with context, and, at an even higher level, of the study of the thinking space which allowed and influenced the creation of the work.the latter includes, for example, the study of the political and economic power institutions, educational institutions, museums and artistic events (e.g. festivals and auctions) which recreate the discourse space and approve or reject some works. therefore, in the present research, the study of art from discourse point of view means going beyond studying artistic styles. this view allows us to study new trends in art, such as feministic, national, colonial, asian, and other regional arts (e.g. middle east). while studying the art of the middle east, we face various questions: are the artistic works of the middle eastern artists a kind of representation of their social and cultural conditions or just cliché responses to the curiosity of the west into middle eastern affairs? are these artists deconstructing the oriental clichés about islamic territories or reconstructing the same in a new, customer-oriented appearance? is the middle eastern art reconstructing the media clichés of the geography of the islamic fundamentalism (in terms of al-qaida and september 11)? or have there appeared new social demands in postcolonial islamic societies seeking common human values regardless of cultural boundaries? finally, it is shown that the art of the middle east is a new narration of the tradition versus modernity conflict in a political geopolitics within the cultural scope of the islamic art. it is also shown that the art of the middle east is not a representative of islamic art; it is rather the representative of modern art in the most important islamic countries. in order to show the middle eastern art as a discourse product, foucault’s analysis of discourse forms has been applied therefore, the four factors of discourse – unity of object, unity of enunciative modalities, unity of concepts system, and unity of strategy – have been analyzed, as regards the middle eastern art, in order to specify the characteristics of its discourse.