Posted on 10/14/2007 12:13:28 AM PDT by BlackVeil
TEHRAN (AFP) - A video installation by world-famous US artist Bill Viola. Contemporary Japanese art tackling AIDS. A print by an Iranian filmmaker whose most recent work was not shown in the Islamic republic.
Perhaps not what you would expect to find in central Tehran, currently in the midst of its strictest moral crackdown in years and capital of a country increasingly at odds with the West over its controversial nuclear programme.
But all these works are part of a show at Tehran's museum of contemporary arts -- which shows there remains life in the Iranian arts scene under conservative President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
The exhibition, entitled "Manifestations of Contemporary Art in Iran," shows paintings, sculpture, photography, video art, performance and installations, garnering an enthusiastic reaction from visitors.
"We are looking for different meanings of art, and the avant-garde is one of them. Culture encompasses a larger domain and it is much more elevated than politics," the head of visual arts at the ministry of culture and the museum director Habibollah Sadeghi told AFP.
"We do not reject the Western culture and art but we want to say that Eastern culture has something to say. Cultures leave impressions on one another. Iranian artists have influenced cubism, symbolism and fauvism," he added.
"We wanted to show the level of influence of our art on the other arts, all arts have their own effects," he added.
Cultural life in Iran had enjoyed something of a renaissance under reformist President Mohammad Khatami.
Months before he left office in 2005, the Tehran Museum of Contemporary Arts put on public show its remarkable collection of work by Western artists including Gauguin, Picasso, Pollack and Warhol that had spent much of the past 25 years locked away.
Before Ahmadinejad came to power, there were fears he would clamp down severely on all non-religious cultural activities. Publishers and filmmakers have complained about increased restrictions on their work.
But the museum's latest exhibition shows there remains cultural life in a country long renowned as one of the most intellectually vibrant in the Middle East.
"This is a good show, but hope this could happen more often. This is a contemporary art museum, so more of these is greatly appreciated," said Ashkan, an art student as he walked around the gallery.
One of the prominent Iranian works in the show is from Kouroush Adim, whose "God Is Eternal" (Howa al-Baghi) shows an old Iranian cemetery covering a small hall filled with dirt and covered with grave stones with calligraphic inscriptions.
The star attraction is US conceptual artist Bill Viola's "Reflecting Pool." A six-minute video installation shows a fully clothed man jumping and then suspended above a pool. He then appears under water before climbing out naked.
However, in a sign of the sensitivities of showing art in Iran, the brief but crucial segment of nudity at the end of the film has been blurred. The video was not shown until several days after the exhibition opening, owing to a "technical problem."
"I liked the piece, it talks about birth. But no one should touch the work of an artist," said Hadis, 22, an IT graduate.
A number of works by Masami Teraoka, a Japanese contemporary painter and printmaker are also on display. Two watercolours from "AIDS Series/Geisha and AIDS Nightmare" collections show the artist's voyage into a darker realm.
In two separate pieces, both watercolours, Teraoka shows women in Geisha attire tearing up condom packets with uneasy and guilty faces.
American conceptual artist Suzanne Lacy is also represented with an audio installations work entitled "Stories of Work and Survival," in which the visitor lies down on a cushion and listens to one of her 12 recordings of American women with different ethnic backgrounds and professions talking about their life struggles.
"I appreciated the support from my sisters, mothers, and grandmothers saying that we are there for you," said a woman on an audio CD from one of the works pertaining to the American natives.
Another top draw is a beautiful canvas print entitled "Winter" by Iran's best-known and Cannes-prize winning filmmaker Abbas Kiarostami, whose most recent films have been banned from cinemas in the Islamic republic.
"Kiarostami is one of Iran's top artists and I kiss his hand," said Sadeghi.
"Just as Kamaledin Behzad (Iran's famous miniaturist artist) is my brother, Van Gogh and Picasso are my brothers," he said.
The exhibit started on September 24 and according the organisers it will last until mid-November.
Is that a picture from a film?
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