A huge gathering of visual art experts and fans turned up on Tuesday at the Saba Cultural and Artistic Institute in Tehran to celebrate the biggest visual art event of the year with the opening of the 7th Fajr International Festival of Visual Arts.
Art deputy at the ministry of culture and Islamic guidance Ali Moradkhani pointed to the increased number of works at this year’s edition and said, “fortunately, in addition to the growth in the quantity, the quality of works have also improved.”
Moradkhani stressed that the ministry plans to hold a major festival to cover all different fields of art under one platform, and to do so various art institutes “should help, support, and handle a part of the work,” Honaronline reported.
The 7th festival saw a total of 1100 works from 700 artists on display, festival secretary Mojtaba Aghaei said. “A book of the exhibited works will also be published after the festival,” he noted.
What distinguishes this festival from its previous editions is that it is non-competitive. Elaborating on this distinctive feature, Aghaei said, “thanks to the organizers, this year there is a sense of companionship instead of competition among the participants ranging from experts and masters to the young talent.”
He also underlined that on February 8 another exhibition of visual arts will be launched as part of the ‘Prophet of Kindness’ campaign at the Iranian Artists’ Forum. The campaign seeks to express artists’ denouncement of the insults to the holy Prophet of Islam. In addition, a painting workshop will be held as well.
Evolution
“The festival is passing through the course of its development and the publication of various books in different fields is an example of this evolution,” Aghaei added. “Visual arts in Iran have the potential to go international and to flaunt their talent before the world.”
The opening of the main section of the festival at Saba Institute was followed by the inauguration of the ‘Art of Revolution’ section at the Palestine Museum of Contemporary Art in Tehran.
“The displayed works, especially photos, reminds us of the not-so-far memories of the 1979 Islamic Revolution,” Moradkhani stated. Most of the creators of the works, young at that time, did their best to record the events and introduce them to the public through the medium of art.
The festival exhibiting works from 9 art fields including poster design, illustration, calligraphy, ceramic art, photography, cartoon, sculpture, painting, and Persian painting will conclude on March 3.
