Journal of Art and Civilization of the Orient

The Mediating Role of the Ottoman Empire in Transferring Western Artistic Modernity to Qajar Iran: A Comparative Study of Artistic Transformations in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries

https://doi.org/10.22034/jaco.2026.563816.1505
Volume 14, Issue 52
Summer 2026
Pages 6-13
Journal of Art and Civilization of the Orient

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

Neshat Farrokhi
Fereshteh Rahmani

Department of Art, Technical and Vocational University (TVU), Tehran, Iran

Abstract
The emergence of visual modernity in Qajar Iran has often been explained in historical and art-historical scholarship as the result of a direct encounter between Iran and European aesthetic concepts. However, a comparative examination of the routes through which these concepts travelled reveals that the decisive mediating role of the Ottoman Empire, acting as an active cultural filter and an initial locus of localization, has largely been overlooked. The central problem addressed in this study concerns the actual trajectory through which visual modernity took shape in Iran and the factors that enabled the formation of a distinctive, multilayered version of modernity during the Qajar period. Accordingly, the study assumes that visual modernity in Iran was not the outcome of direct transmission from Europe but the result of a circulation of visual concepts from Europe to the Ottoman Empire and subsequently to Iran, during which the Ottomans functioned as agents of adaptation, refinement, and cultural alignment with the Islamic world. This research aims to reconstruct this multi-stage trajectory and to explain how modern visual concepts were reinterpreted within the Shiʿi tradition, courtly structures, and Iranian aesthetic sensibilities. Employing a descriptive-analytical method based on documentary study, comparative visual analysis, and the examination of cultural transfer networks, the findings indicate that European artistic concepts were first tested and adapted in Ottoman artistic institutions before being transferred to Iran in a culturally modified form. Iran, in turn, re-localized these adapted concepts by integrating them with its own traditional, religious, and aesthetic frameworks, thereby producing the hybrid visual styles characteristic of Qajar art. Ultimately, the study concludes that Qajar visual modernity was neither a mere imitation of the West nor a rupture with tradition, but the outcome of a multilayered process of conceptual circulation and creative localization within an inter-civilizational sphere linking Europe, the Ottoman Empire, and Iran.

Keywords

Visual Modernity
Circulation of Concepts
Ottoman Empire
Artistic Localization
Qajar Art
diation in the introduction of lithography to Iran. Journal of the History of Foreign Relations, 20(80), 103–126.
Akyüz, K. (1969). Modern Türk edibetının ana kızheleri [Main lines of modern Turkish literature]. Türkoloji Dergisi, 2(1), 1–24.
Ayvazoğlu, B. (1989). Türkiye’de sanat tarihi ve estetikle ilgili ilk çalışmalar. Erdem, 5(15), 977-992. https://dergipark.org.tr/en/download/article-file/692773 
Baharloo, A., Hassanvand, M. K., & Khazaei, M. (2020). The Stylistic Similarities in Royal and Folk Portraits of Qajar Painting. Journal of Fine Arts, 25(1), 25-36. https://doi.org/10.22059/jfava.2018.254322.665894
Barkçin, S. (2017). Medeniyet, müzik ve mimari [Civilization, music and architecture]. Düşünen Şehir, 4, 26–39.
Bilim, C. (1999). Osmanılar’da Eğitim Çağdaşlaşması, Askeri Okullar. TA Ankara.
Erinç, S. (2013). Dimensions of art [Dimensions of art]. Ütopya Yayınları. 
Delzende, S. (2016). تحولات تصویری هنر ایران [Picturial Evolution of  Iranian Art]. Nazar Publishing. [in Persian]
Germaner, S. (1992). Osmanlı-Fransız culture relations in the second half of the century and Osman Hamdi Bey, In Osman Hamdi Bey Kongresi Bildiriler. Mimar Sinan University.
Ghelichkhani, H. (2020). The influence of Ottoman calligraphy on Nasta'liq in the Qajar court. Mah-e Honar.
Hamadeh, S. (2008). The City’s Pleasures: Istanbul in the eighteenth century. Seattle and London.
Karabulut, M. (2008). Batılılaşma açısından tanzimat dönemi Türk romanı. Yayınlanmış doktora tezi, Fırat Üniversitesi Sosyal Bilimler Enstitüsü, Elazığ.
Karabulut, M. (2010). Tanzimat Donemi’nde Osmanlinin Yenilesme Surecine Bir Bakis. Türk Dünyası Araştırmaları, (187), 125-138. https://turkoloji.cu.edu.tr/YENI%20TURK%20EDEBIYATI/mustafa_karabulut_tanzimat_osmanli_yenilesme.pdf 
Khatoonabadi, A. (2012). شعر و نقاشی در دوران قاجار: چالش سنت و مدرنیتۀ ادبیات پارسی معاصر [Poetry and painting in Qajar era :the challenge of tradition and modernity of contemporary persian literature] .Humanities and Cultural Studies, 1(2), 39-55. [in Persian]. https://ensani.ir/file/download/article/20130130083349-9726-3.pdf
Kodaman, B. (1980). Avrupa emperializminin Osmanlı İmparatorluğu'na giriş vasıtaları. Milli Kültür Dergisi, 24-33.
Kodaman, B. (2005). Osmanlı'dan Cumhuriyet'e kontaktılarşa laşma sılarını. Selçuk Üniversitesi Türkiyat Araştırmaları Dergisi, 18, 149–158.selcuk.edu.tr
Meriç, C. (1983). Batıda ve bizde aydının serüveni: Cumhuriyet dönemi Türkiye ansiklopedisi C. 1. İletişim Yayınları, İstanbul.
Moran, B. (1998). Türk romanına eleştirel tışar I. İletişim.
Mohammadi, A. (2024). The interactive triangle of modern art in the Middle East. Journal of Interdisciplinary Art Studies, 14(52), 41–60. Bc.edubc.eduMA in Middle Eastern Studies
Naipoglu, S. (2008). Sanayi-i Nefise Mektebi'nde sanat tarihi ve vahit bey [Doctoral dissertation, Hacettepe Üniversitesi].
Özdemir, N. (1997). Anatolian folk culture, art, sculpture and music. Nurol Matbaacılık.
Ökten, S. (2017). Gelenek, sanat ve medeniyet. Sufi Kitap.
Sevengil, A. (1962). Saray teatrosu Milli Eğitim Basımevi.https://www.meb.gov.tr
Shaw, S. (1991). The Cambridge History of Iran. Cambridge University Press.
Tansuğ, S. (1991). Çağdaş Türk sanatı. Remzi Kitabevi.
Tunçay, M. (1989). Tanzimat Fermanı. Tarih ve Toplum, 12(71), 10–11.
Yılmaz, M. (2013). Modernizmden postmodernizme sanat. Ütopia.

Home

Submit Manuscript

Contact Us