Propagating modernities: art and architectural patronage of Shahbanu Farah Pahlavi


Tezin Türü: Doktora

Tezin Yürütüldüğü Kurum: Orta Doğu Teknik Üniversitesi, Mimarlık Fakültesi, Mimarlık Bölümü, Türkiye

Tezin Onay Tarihi: 2014

Öğrenci: BAHARAK TABİBİ

Danışman: AYŞE BELGİN ÖZKAYA

Özet:

This dissertation focuses on the last decade of the Pahlavi era to understand the role of royal Pahlavi women in the shaping of Iranian "modernity" within the broader context of architecture. Exploring various relations between gender, power, art and architectural practice, this study is an attempt to assess the authoritarian modernization under the royal patronage of Shahbanu Farah Pahlavi and the influential role she maintained in popularization of modern Iranian culture. The last decade of the Pahlavi era marks a crucial turning point in the enforcement of reforms aiming at the deep transformation in the Iranian cultural modernity. While many efforts were made to rebuild a nation, the shahbanu was the initial driving force behind the comprehensive reform program in the fields of art and architecture. Endowed with the role of regent, the shahbanu shaped much of the cultural agenda of the Pahlavi era during the last decade of the Iranian monarchy. Patronizing numerous social, cultural and educational organizations, she enacted Pahlavis' modernization ideologies by constructing and renovating buildings, establishing art centers, institutionalizing museums, and organizing national and international symposiums and conferences in various fields of arts and architecture. For Shahbanu Farah, culture was an appropriate instrument to legitimize politics.