Journal of Researches in Islamic Architecture

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Nowadays Islamic countries more than ever concentrate on identity to revive their dignity at the age of globalization. Countries of west of Asia especially Persian Gulf countries enjoy a prosperous architectural era because of oil well revenues. Saudi Arabia from among them selected purposely to analyses to understand interaction of localization and globalization in contemporary architecture of developing countries. Saudi Arabia as the birthplace of Islam with the growing economy in recent years, is a good context for massive constructions, which result in identity crisis in contemporary architecture. Economic growth during last 40 years in these countries has affected various aspects of their lives. Undoubtedly architecture and urbanism as one of the main substrates were affected by these developments. Limitation of construction technology and engineers’ abilities in these countries made the Arabs to assign the designing and construction phase of their huge projects to European and American architects and engineers with completely different background and cultural beliefs from Muslims’. Although some researches have focused on identity crisis in modern architecture, very few researches have noted the interaction and conflict between the Islamic identity and contemporary architecture. The main objective of this research is to identify and analyze the native and Islamic identity in contemporary architecture of Saudi Arabia. The main research questions are: 1- What are the main current trends in contemporary architecture of Saudi Arabia? And how they have noted the concept of identity in their works? What is the relationship between theory (what the architects have in their minds or the goal they are following to reach an ideal design) and practice (what is observed in final result or understood by people) in contemporary architecture of Saudi Arabia? According to the theoretical framework, current buildings in Saudi Arabia are analyzed based on five general parameters and factors: 1-Main idea forming the design (concept), 2-The Construction Technology, 3- The material in the unit, 4- The shape and form of the unit, 5- the relationship with the surrounding environment. This article analyzed the buildings of the past two decades impartially in terms of the referred parameters. This research consists of two main parts. In the first part the architect’s opinion about his/her design was discussed. In the second part researchers analyzed the mentioned works according to the theoretical framework. The comparative analysis of the architect's comments about his work and researchers’ inferences can determine the distance between theory and practice of contemporary architecture in Saudi Arabia, then the architect’s success in achieving his/her objectives will be determined. This comparison will indicate whether the architects have succeeded in conveying their ideas to people or not. To meet scheduled objectives, fifty artworks were selected randomly from among the buildings designed in the past two decades, and were analyzed according to the main parameters. Then the quantitative data were transferred to SPSS22 software to determine the correlation between these two groups. Studies conducted indicate that a considerable proportion of contemporary architecture in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia are design by foreign architects who are not familiar enough with Islam as the official religion of the country. We can see some puzzlement in contemporary architecture due to the diversity of forms and concepts. The architects’ description about their own works indicated that the main trends of contemporary architecture are in the use of postmodern forms, conceptualism, prevalent structures and modern materials. The findings indicate what architects statements and opinions expressed in the form of Islamic revival, is leading to imitate the famous forms of ancient architecture in practice. In fact, imitation of ancient forms and reconstruction of them by modern technologies means the expression of Islamic and native identity in contemporary architecture to most of the foreign architects. This leads to a contradiction between the theory and practice in contemporary works, although the construction quality of the analyzed samples is remarkable. To solve these problems it is essential to assign projects to vernacular architects and engineers where possible. Native architects with Islamic culture and beliefs will be more capable than foreign ones in expression and manifestation of Islamic identity in their works. On the other hand foreign architects should change their strategies in dealing with problems. Avoiding imitation of old patterns, getting more information about theories, Islamic culture, main needs and aspirations of Muslims are some of these strategies helping the architects to deal with the referred problems. These challenges make some serious threats and challenged contemporary architecture of developing countries. The results of the paper show that new architectural technologies and revivalist trends are the most important players in contemporary architecture of developing countries such as Saudi Arabia and other Persian Gulf countries because of their richness in cultural heritage, spiritual findings and local identity.

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Nowadays Islamic countries more than ever concentrate on identity to revive their dignity at the age of globalization. Countries of west of Asia especially Persian Gulf countries enjoy a prosperous architectural era because of oil well revenues. Saudi Arabia from among them selected purposely to analyses to understand interaction of localization and globalization in contemporary architecture of developing countries. Saudi Arabia as the birthplace of Islam with the growing economy in recent years, is a good context for massive constructions, which result in identity crisis in contemporary architecture. Economic growth during last 40 years in these countries has affected various aspects of their lives. Undoubtedly architecture and urbanism as one of the main substrates were affected by these developments. Limitation of construction technology and engineers’ abilities in these countries made the Arabs to assign the designing and construction phase of their huge projects to European and American architects and engineers with completely different background and cultural beliefs from Muslims’. Although some researches have focused on identity crisis in modern architecture, very few researches have noted the interaction and conflict between the Islamic identity and contemporary architecture. The main objective of this research is to identify and analyze the native and Islamic identity in contemporary architecture of Saudi Arabia. The main research questions are: 1- What are the main current trends in contemporary architecture of Saudi Arabia? And how they have noted the concept of identity in their works? What is the relationship between theory (what the architects have in their minds or the goal they are following to reach an ideal design) and practice (what is observed in final result or understood by people) in contemporary architecture of Saudi Arabia? According to the theoretical framework, current buildings in Saudi Arabia are analyzed based on five general parameters and factors: 1-Main idea forming the design (concept), 2-The Construction Technology, 3- The material in the unit, 4- The shape and form of the unit, 5- the relationship with the surrounding environment. This article analyzed the buildings of the past two decades impartially in terms of the referred parameters. This research consists of two main parts. In the first part the architect’s opinion about his/her design was discussed. In the second part researchers analyzed the mentioned works according to the theoretical framework. The comparative analysis of the architect's comments about his work and researchers’ inferences can determine the distance between theory and practice of contemporary architecture in Saudi Arabia, then the architect’s success in achieving his/her objectives will be determined. This comparison will indicate whether the architects have succeeded in conveying their ideas to people or not. To meet scheduled objectives, fifty artworks were selected randomly from among the buildings designed in the past two decades, and were analyzed according to the main parameters. Then the quantitative data were transferred to SPSS22 software to determine the correlation between these two groups. Studies conducted indicate that a considerable proportion of contemporary architecture in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia are design by foreign architects who are not familiar enough with Islam as the official religion of the country. We can see some puzzlement in contemporary architecture due to the diversity of forms and concepts. The architects’ description about their own works indicated that the main trends of contemporary architecture are in the use of postmodern forms, conceptualism, prevalent structures and modern materials. The findings indicate what architects statements and opinions expressed in the form of Islamic revival, is leading to imitate the famous forms of ancient architecture in practice. In fact, imitation of ancient forms and reconstruction of them by modern technologies means the expression of Islamic and native identity in contemporary architecture to most of the foreign architects. This leads to a contradiction between the theory and practice in contemporary works, although the construction quality of the analyzed samples is remarkable. To solve these problems it is essential to assign projects to vernacular architects and engineers where possible. Native architects with Islamic culture and beliefs will be more capable than foreign ones in expression and manifestation of Islamic identity in their works. On the other hand foreign architects should change their strategies in dealing with problems. Avoiding imitation of old patterns, getting more information about theories, Islamic culture, main needs and aspirations of Muslims are some of these strategies helping the architects to deal with the referred problems. These challenges make some serious threats and challenged contemporary architecture of developing countries. The results of the paper show that new architectural technologies and revivalist trends are the most important players in contemporary architecture of developing countries such as Saudi Arabia and other Persian Gulf countries because of their richness in cultural heritage, spiritual findings and local identity.

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There were the glorious examples of the architecture of mosque once in Iran.They were the places for equality between all classes, so they must have qualities for invitation, guidance, and reminder and call the believers and attract other followers of religions as the missionary of Islam. This invitation is not only in the field of vision, but also in terms of audio and other means, such as multi-functionality, centrality, and location of deployment. This architecture was considered to be the main factor in identifying the complexes of Muslims due to its comprehensiveness, importance, severalty and high status in the past times, But today it has lost its inviting role because of structural changes. In contemporary times, as well as the changes in the structure of the city, due to the changing needs and functions of the mosques, as well as the distinction with dimensions and their location in the urban structure and economic constraints, the goals and characteristics of the mosques were also forgotten; So that today all the social groups have reacted from citizens and worshipers to architects and urban designers.
Paying attention to the Invitation role of the mosques forms the central idea of the present paper. It is one of the pillars of urban design and planning in contemporary city centers and neighborhoods. All aspects of the invitation in the body, function and meaning are important in this research. The present paper addresses this question: How can we use the physical, functional and semantic components of the mosques to enhance the quality of the invitation on the urban and local scale, the entrance view, as well as the interior space of the building. This paper is looking for the optimal design process. In this regard, using the content analysis methodology, we are going to refresh the actions and theories in the field of related topics. We are presented a desirable process to promote the quality of the invitation of contemporary mosques by achieving a conceptual and applied framework. We elaborate the subject by selecting 8 examples of contemporary Tehran mosques. We analyses the elements affecting the general form of the building, the external walls, the design and the entrance and the interior space of the mosques by referring to library resources and field observations. The results of the analysis show that an ideal set of physical factors to semantic components affects mosque admission that has a significant effect on the enhancement of the presence of the individual and the community. These results categorizes and describes in terms of criteria of visibility and centrality in urban scale, admission and guidance in middle-level scale, meaningfulness and visual memory in the outer walls and the entrance perspective, convergence and spatial regulation in the interior space of the mosques.

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The modern architect places a lot of weight on his status as an artist and heavily relies on changes like unique and self-aware language. Different intellectual foundations are effective in the production of form in architectural studies, which can be categorized in many areas, including conscious and unconscious. The researcher is attempting to determine how much the conscious mind and how much the unconscious contributed to the production of form during the contemporary era and the Safavid era, respectively. Two historical-comparative and documentary guidelines served as the foundation for this research, which was carried out using a qualitative approach. The study environment consists of documents that discuss the conceptual foundations of both the Safavid and contemporary eras. Based on the votes provided during both eras, it is important to consider the relationship between form production and creativity. As a result, a comparison was done using this index and the variables that affect it. Intellectual and artistic creativity has an unconscious nature, while scientific and logical creativity has a conscious nature. The comparative findings demonstrated that in Safavid architecture, the artist himself is transformed and finds new creativity throughout the creation of his works of art. To guide the soul in its substantial motion and to build a suitable platform for the realization of its transcendental powers, or, in other words, to lay the foundation for the immateriality of the soul, is the responsibility of the artist in the reciprocal relationship with his created product. The science of rational man is a sensual science. The Safavid era had rich and powerful intellectual roots in the unconscious process, which had an impact on the production of forms in architecture. Sacred art, in contrast to modern art, places meaning before style. Author architects discuss the phenomenon as a whole, as well as the contradictions between context and flexibility. From their perspective, however, the audience of the work is what matters since they bring the text to life, not the architect who merely recreates reality. They discuss intuition, existential experiences, and the unity of human nature. However, there is no information available regarding the nature of this encounter, the identification of the existential reality, or the advancement of it in the direction of a singular nature. Given the volume of information available to him, the architect must prioritize what can be resolved in his mind. Additionally, Eisenman believes that this individual expression occasionally promotes isolationist inventiveness without consideration for a unified order. Based on these foundations and their analysis, it is possible to conclude that it is urgently necessary to use the unconscious process in the creation of form in order to enhance the quality of the design and make it appropriate for the environment. This can be accomplished without placing the shape in its actual context by taking into consideration the inconsistencies since the architect's capacity to fully and completely comprehend the values and concepts in the universe and connect to the subconscious is constrained. Contextual construction compatibility is the result.