Art House
Conference of the Birds
In my youth I envisioned beautiful magical birds and avidly frequented and lost myself in the woods and flower gardens of my childhood dwellings. I was entranced by fairy...
Early Feminist Cartoons
Cartoons depicting Iranian women from 1900 to 1917 On the way to the public bath: "You cannot trust women or horses." "Wow, look Karbalaie Hassan! A foreign woman!" Reprinted by...
'I'll Huff and I'll Puff'
Ramin Haerizadeh's exhibition "I'll Huff and I'll Puff" on Sunday March 14 in Dubai features new collages that stage an assault on the imagery he has grown up with...
Habitats
Home and Album NYT | March 6, 2010 Mr. Yomtobian, 26, was born in Tehran to Jewish parents, the youngest of four children. In 1987, after years of tumult that...
The 50/50 Club: Author Saïd Sayrafiezadeh
[ Q & A ] Saïd Sayrafiezadeh is a member of what I like to call the 50/50 club, the offspring of one Iranian and one non-Iranian parent. When I...
Tehran Has No More Pomegranates
[ film ] Anyone who has lived in Tehran knows how rapidly it morphs and expands. One can hardly keep track of the establishments opening or being shut down...
Blurring the lines
Zahra's Paradise, a graphic novel about the social and political situation in Iran, will be serialized online beginning at midnight. Initially, the serialization will reflect events in Iran's recent past,...
Zand Trails, Pt. 2
Sia Part 1 | At 11 p.m., I navigated a lumbering cart stuffed with suitcases through Mehrabad International Airport in Tehran. I'd exchanged $200, and was handed stacks of Rial...
The Writing on the Wall
As Tehran braces for a fresh bout of protests on 22 Bahman (February 11), the anniversary of the revolution, public spaces in the city have been peppered with graffiti promoting...
Scrapbook: 1978-79
"Massive Peace March," "Unauthorized rallied banned," "Massive sit-ins," "Worst rioting in Tehran," "Opposition can have voice," "Soldier brothers don't kill brothers," "Only Democracy can save Iran," etc. Distinctly 1970s --...
They Did Not Hang My Son Today
They did not hang my son today But they killed hers. He was nineteen, they say. At dawn (Always at dawn) They took him and Put a noose around his...
Forget journalism...
[ trends ] Vogue-style fashion magazines have been cropping up in Tehran over the past two years, and particularly visible this year. Rouyesh (Growth) and Zendeghiyeh Edehaal (Ideal Lifestyle) are...
Urban Askance: One Day in Tehran
[ exhibit ] Through January 23, San Francisco's Intersection for the Arts provides a glimpse inside Tehran. One Day: A Collective Narrative of Tehran features work by Tehran's urban...
Nargess Hashemi: Wrap Me Up in You
Nargess Hashemi reproduces scenes from her family's traditional gatherings over the past year. We see line drawings of engagement parties and weddings laid over kitsch wrapping paper and floral...
Looking Backward: 2009
As a political cartoonist forced to leave the country in 2003 after receiving a death threat, I should probably hate the rulers in Iran. Though I am not a big...
The Zand Trail
[ passport ] I wondered what of my trip to Iran I'd remember; of course, I'd recorded much in my journal. But only so much can be recounted or recorded,...
Téhéran sans autorisation
More about Sepideh Farsi's film "Tehran without permission" (or accreditation) can be found on the The New York Time's Lede blog. An English translation of the lyrics to Hich-Kas's...
Going Underground
[ film ] Kurdish-Iranian director Bahman Ghobadi, known for making slow-moving, heart-rendering films along the western border of Kurdistan (A Time For Drunken Horses, Turtles Can Fly, Half Moon),...
The Force Strikes Back
[ snapshot ] A stunt pulled by Iran's state media to humiliate student leader Majid Tavakoli backfired -- big time. Tavakoli was arrested on Monday in Tehran after addressing...
Bassidji: Talking to the Other Side
An interview with director Mehran Tamadon. [ film ] A young boy sits on rusted tank tracks in the desert bordering Iran and Iraq. His head is bowed, and he's...
Rough Cut
In this untitled, uncredited documentary, images of the post-election crisis play out against the official narrative put forth by state television, dictated at Friday prayers and by Iran's Supreme...
Open case: Kiarostami's film reemerges after 30 years
Ghazieh shekle aval shekle dovvom from Green Mind on Vimeo. [ film ] In the magnificent haste and enthusiasm of Iranians to share insight about the questionable presidential election in...
Fared Shafinury & Tehranosaurus
[ spotlight ] Much of the 'fusion music' pumped out by a new generation of bands in Iran -- Ohum, 127, and early Kiosk -- transitions from East to...
"My Grade-School Friend"
[ art house ] Revolutionary anthems hardly come any more powerful than Yare Dabestani Man, or "My Grade-School Friend," Iran's resistance anthem par excellence. The revolution-era classic, whose stirring...
Ebrahim Nabavi: Letter to Hussein
[ satire ] Author's note: Hussein is my cousin, who left Iran for America thirty years ago. I have not heard from him since; he's become an American. Any semblance...
Two films depict 1970s Iran
Albert Lamorisse (1922-1970) Baadeh Sabah / The Lovers' Wind / Vent Des Amoureux [English language] [Farsi Version] Shot 1970, completed posthumously 1978, 35mm Title Unknown (Postscript to Baadeh Sabah)...
Political Hip Hop
[ music ] Tehran's underground music scene is explored in a number of documentaries, including Amir Hamz's "Sounds of Silence" and Bahman Ghobadi's "No One Knows About Persian Cats,"...
Makhmalbaf opens up on Green Movement
Hana Makhmalbaf interviewed her father, prominent filmmaker Mohsen Makhmalbaf, the Paris-based spokesman for opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi, about the future of the Green Movement and the prospect of a...
Slashing Red Tape on the Silver Screen
[ film ] Censorship is watertight in Iran, as scores of farhangis -- those involved in culture and the arts -- well know. A telling symptom of this all-prevailing malaise...
My Uncle's Wife
[ passport ] I spent my first couple of evenings in Iran two years ago watching TV news with my uncle's orange-haired wife at their house in a Karaj gated...
The Mother Tongue
An introduction to Persian by Ghazzal Dabiri, a lecturer and coordinator of Persian at Columbia University. Useful Links Google Persian Transliteration | instructions. Google Translation Language Lab Farsi Dictionary...
The Green Apple
Arts and politics converge in New York. [ art house ] The Iranian Diaspora -- approximately 3 million worldwide -- turned out in larger numbers than seen since the...
Iranian Film Festival- San Francisco 9/19-20
When Saeed Shafa began making plans for the inaugural Tiburon International Film Festival, it was with the simple motto of encouraging local residents to "understand the world through film."...
From Madman to Ad Man
Photos/William Levin @Jewish Robot Ahmadinejad Promotes Free Israel Trips for U.S. College Students By MARSHA B. COHEN | 6 Sept 2009 A program which offers college-age Jews free ten-day...
Kayhan for Kids: shaping young hearts and minds
By GOLAB P. Kayhan Bacheha -- Kayhan for Kids -- is a weekly magazine for children published by the Kayhan Institute, the same publisher that prints the daily Kayhan...
New Logos
[TEHRAN BUREAU] Blog Watch Blogger Gorizsabz has designed new logos for the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) and NAJA (the police forces). The caption says: "No copyright whatsoever and...
The Coup against Mazdakite
Uprising in Ferdowsi's Shahnameh and Quest for Social Justice in today's Iran. By REZA AKHLAGHI in Toronto The influence of clergy over Iranian society is not limited to today's...
The Art of Translation
Solmaz Shahbazi, Still from "Persepolis," 2005, Single Channel Video, 1 projection, 17 minutes. Courtesy of the Artist. Image from arteeast.org."Tarjama/Translation" at the Queens Museum of Art [TEHRAN BUREAU] In...
40 DAYS AGO WE DIED
FORTY DAYS AGO WE DIED By Setareh Sabety Forty days ago we died Along with that mother Whose scream I still hear Not only in my ear But deeper...
I am Neda
I Am Neda Leave the Basiji bullet in my heart, fall to prayer in my blood, and hush, father -- I am not dead. More light than mass, I...
Artful Resistance
Artful Resistance: A selection of post-election artwork By Saya Ovaisy in Tehran | 26 July 2009 Between midnight and dawn on June 13, a community of pro-Reformist voters held...
In This Blind Alley
"In This Blind Alley," by Ahmad Shamlou They smell your mouth Lest you've told someone 'I love you.' They smell your heart These are strange times, my dear Love,...
Picturing Ourselves: 1953, 1979 and 2009
A Conversation with Negar Mottahedeh By GOLBARG BASHI in New York | 12 July 2009 [TEHRAN BUREAU] The surge of stunning photos and videos from Iran over the past...
The Arab Roaming the Streets of Tehran
In Memoriam: Ardeshir Mohassess (1938-2008) Cartoonist: Historian of our fears and frivolities By HAMID DABASHI in New York | 7 July 2009 It was in late February 2004. Quite tired...
Revolution Redux: The Shah of Shahs
Revolution Redux: Looking back on Ryszard Kapuscinski's The Shah of Shahs By MATTHEW GHAZARIAN [TEHRAN BUREAU] It has become popular for analysts of the Middle East to make a...
Iran Inside Out
Pooneh Maghazehe, Hell's Puerto Rico Performance Still, DigitalC-print 2008, copyright artist and courtesy Leila Taghinia-Milani Heller Gallery. By LEILA DARABI in New York | 28 June 2009 The line...
Filmmaker Speaks Out
Bahman Farmanara: We cannot remain silent By MUHAMMAD SAHIMI in Los Angeles | 27 June 2009 In a short open letter to the Iranian people, Bahman Farmanara, the distinguished...
'The Viper of Kerman'
BOOK REVIEW: 'The Viper of Kerman', by Christian Oliver, Halban, ISBN 978-1-905559-12-1 Reviewed by Gareth Smyth [TEHRAN BUREAU] Anyone having difficulty assessing the veracity of reports from Iran --...
Looped and Layered
Siamak Filizadeh, Bread, Cheese & Image, 2007 By LEILA DARABI in New York | 4 June 2009 [TEHRAN BUREAU] There are two kinds of Iranian art often exhibited in...
Suitcases
Suitcases Suitcases of dried limes, dried figs, pomegranate paste, parsley laid in the sun, burnt honey, sugar cubes hardened on a baking sheet. Suitcases of practical underwear, hand-washed, dried...
Marking the 30th
[gallery link="file" columns="5" orderby="post_name"] The Islamic Republic, three decades later... February 2009 marked the 30th anniversary of the Iranian revolution. Photojournalist Fabio Bucciarelli (see below) traveled there and documented a...
Oh Persepolis
_______________________________________________________________________________________________ Archives Iran's booming art scene By GOLNOUSH NIKNEJAD in Dubai [The National] Apr 30, 2008 Sandy Heller, a private curator from New York, gazes at The Wall (Oh...
Iran Night on the Lower East Side
[Tehran Bureau ] spotlight KGB Non-Fiction Presents Iran Night February 17, 2009 7:00 pm - 9:00 pm 85 East 4th Street New York, NY 10003 Sohrab Mohebbi is the...
The Art (and Politics) of Translation
Bookshop in Tehran. Photo/Faren Taghizadeh Read in Persian. Save our literature.By NILOUFAR TALEBI in New York In 2002, a poet friend of mine, Sally Lee Christian, was recruited by...
Diaspora Marks 30th
By NILOUFAR TALEBI in San Francisco [Tehran Bureau] spotlight Years ago, an Iranian-American friend mockingly referred to me as a '79er. He was referring to my belonging to the...
A Conversation with Kiarostami
Photos/Arsalan MohammadBy ARSALAN MOHAMMAD in Tehran You screened Shirin at the Venice Film Festival. Shirin is a very unusual way of making a film - just the faces. Venice...
From Turkey with Love. But...
Dear Iran, we are scared of you. By AFSIN YURDAKUL in Istanbul It is not that we don't appreciate Kiarostami. Nor it is that we don't admire Rumi or...
And the beat goes on
Photo/LGOIT.com A scroll through Lifegoesonintehran.com feels like a stroll through the capital. Thankfully the virtual tourist is spared the usual traps: the all too prevalent collection of Persian iconography...
The Discreet Charm of the Underclass
By GOLNOUSH NIKNEJAD in Boston [Tehran Bureau] Despite the many obstacles of visas and security officials, renowned Iranian filmmaker Majid Majidi made it to Boston in time for the...
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