The study of language and expression in clay sculpture of Tughril Seljuk with an intertextual approach

Intertextuality in the twentieth century gave way to a new perspective and approach in studies in humanities, especially in literature and art. One of the most important of these trends belongs to Roland Barthes’ theory of intertextuality. The author of this paper has studied art figurine of the Islamic period entitled "Seljuk Sultan Tughril" belonging to 6th and 7th centuries AD by adopting the intertextuality theory. To this effect, first descriptive and historical accounts are presented. Then explorations are made with respect to visual, verbal, and pictorial elements of the system. Finally, these elements are considered holistically and integratively in a ceramic statue of Tughril Seljuk of 6th and 7th centuries AD. In the next stage, by adopting a field study, the impact of the text on the audience and their interpretations of the work are collected and reviewed. To this end, the researcher relied on forty different readings taken through an interview with the art and literature students and the resulting transcriptions were analyzed afterwards. The main purpose of this article is to make the audience familiar with one of the most important approaches of literary criticism and contemporary art that is the theory and practice of intertextuality by Barthes. In light of the study, the audience may have a more accurate recognition of localization and the way it is adapted to the Iranian and Islamic studies. The results show that intertextual reading is a research method which provides the means to review visual art in Islamic Iran. In addition, readings of the audience are often compound readings. In other words, most of the audience who had intertextual reading of the statue also used textual approach and those who had contextual approach, also applied textual and intertextual reading approach. Islamic art is derived from neither the Islamic doctrine nor the Islamic law; rather, it originates from the inner truth of Islam in the Holy book of Quran. The Quran expresses Islam's central thought of monotheistic thinking states. The monolithic thinking not only explains the theoretical basis of Islamic art but also presents examples of this art. Intertextual study of Tughril clay figurines, a work symbolizing Islamic art, evidently represents Islamic law, monotheism and the Quran. The author believes that reading a work of art through the lens of intertextuality can help achieve this goal as any work of art, according to Barthes, is a blind text, text and forms almost beyond recognition in the others with former cultural context and the context of the surrounding culture. By full recognition of the intertextual relations and putting together the artistic interpretation of a text, a complete interpretation of an artistic work may be realized. This article intends to answer these questions: - How does the audience benefit from intertextual relations in clay sculptures? - How many of intertextual readings of the work have explicit references to other texts? - How much of the audience’s reading is verbal, visual or both verbal-visual?