Taraneh Baran Art Gallery in Tehran has organized a public memorial service for the late Iranian calligrapher Reza Mafi (1943-1981).
Mafi came from a family of calligraphers and was a teacher of the art himself. In his paintings he experimented with the expressive qualities of nasta’liq, a hanging script developed in Iran during the 15th century which subsequently became the script of choice in almost all Persian poetic manuscripts.
By focusing on the hanging tails of the letters, he reduced the script to its essentials to create a variety of expressive abstractions which, as his style developed, became increasingly minimalistic and elegant, galleryinfo.ir reported.
Born in Mashhad, Mafi moved to Tehran in 1958, and from 1964 he attended a four-year program in Persian Calligraphy under master calligrapher Seyed Hossein Mirkhani.
Mafi was greatly influenced by Mirza Gholam-Reza Isfahani’s method. The master was one of the greatest calligraphers of the 19th century.
The exhibit is open to the public until May 29 at the gallery located at No. 27, Ladan Alley, Sharifimanesh St., Rumi Bridge, Shariati Ave.
