Documentary painting of artistic scenes in light of Islamic miniatures: Analytical study

Abstract

This study addresses the topic of documentary painting in the structural composition of Islamic miniatures, focusing on the artistic pictorial representation within these miniatures. The study employs a descriptive-analytical method, as it suits the nature of the research, by describing and analyzing selected samples of miniatures in terms of their aesthetic and structural elements, symbolic significance, and intellectual content. The researcher reached several key findings, including that the artistic scenes in miniatures clarify the pictorial text through content and form, decorative and linear elements. The depiction of characters in these scenes is characterized by liveliness and motion, with an absence of rigidity or stillness. Furthermore, the study highlights the attention to decorative backgrounds (such as botanical, geometric, and Arabic calligraphy), as well as architectural backgrounds, which document cultural heritage and civilizational scenes. There is also a contemporary touch evident in breaking the conventional frame in the compositional structure of the artistic scenes. The significance of these miniatures in art scenes is that they cannot be separated from Islamic literature as they are a translation of this literature in terms of pictorial and written texts.