MONIR SHAHROUDY FARMANFARMAIAN: MOSAICS OF MIRRORS by Rose Issa Projects

EDITED BY ROSE ISSA FOREWORD BY FRANK STELLA

MOSAICS OF MIRRORS

MONIR SHAHROUDY FARMANFARMAIAN

Edited by ROSE ISSA Text by: Rose Issa Photographs by: Tim Dallal (minarets, boxes, collages and models), Jila Dejam-Tabah, Nasser Haqiqi (lost pre-Revolutionary works), Rose Issa, Javad Jalali and Bill Wright Design and layout: Hossein Filizadeh Scans: Kanoon Informatic, Kahali English Editor: Katia Hadidian We would like to thank the following for their help with this project: Javad Ahangari, Ahmad Amini, Siah Armajani, Ali Asghar, Dr. Alireza Sami Azar, Mahmoud Reza Bahmanpour, Reza Bahrami, Zara Houshmand, Faryar Javaherian, Sohrab Mahdavi, Nasrin Maleki, Hajji Mohammad Navid, Shahbazi Moqaddam and Kourosh Shahhosseini First published by the Nazar Research and Cultural Institute, Tehran, in 2006 in association with Rose Issa Projects, London. This edition ÂŠ Rose Issa Projects, London 2014

ROSE ISSA PROJECTS WWW.ROSE ISSA.COM

Front and back cover: Detail of a mirror-mosaic panel installation (mirror and reverse-glass painting) at the Hotel Intercontinental (now the Hotel Laleh), Tehran, 1975 (see pages 88-89)

MOSAICS OF MIRRORS

MONIR SHAHROUDY FARMANFARMAIAN With a Foreword by FRANK STELLA

The “Geometric Installations” of 2003-2005 Dasht-e Kavir and Dasht-e Lut represent the physical heart of

time must have seemed other-worldly; that constant harping

Looking at images of Monir’s first exhibition in Tehran in the 21st

theme is varied still further, multiplied, or tilted, or set within an

what we knew as the Persian Empire and what we now know

on flatness and imageless-ness. For Monir, though, this arid

century, a number of reactions rose to mind. I was struck by the

endlessly complex and visually ambiguous framework, and one

as the nation of Iran. The drainage of the great salt marshes

academic chanting brought home echoes of home. What could

continuity of her geometrical vision of the world: as early as the late

must search for the diamond-faceted hexagonal form that, because

creates the desert that occupies most of the Iranian Plateau.

be more arid, imageless and flat than the centre of her homeland,

1970s I had become aware of her extraordinary glass and mirror-

this is the 21st century and not the 11th, does not quite sit at the

It seems hard to imagine that the art of the people who have

the Dasht-e Kavir and the Dasht-e Lut?

glass sculptures, the latter so clearly developed from the mirror-

centre of the panel in which it lies. Just as that 19th-century

mosaics of Iranian architectural decoration of the later Safavid

invention, the kaleidoscope, offers intense colours and geometrical

lived surrounding the edges of this emptiness should have produced an art so determined to fill space. Yet more than

In New York, the new conventions of abstraction and their

period (mid-17th century). Now, in 2006, it is clear that this

complexities of shard-like forms that turn, endlessly, around a single

anything else, that is what art conceived as ornament does.

expression in measured geometries must have resonated deeply

geometrical vision is an enduring one, remaining close to her heart

fixed point, never repeating, ever creating some new, complex,

Ornament fills space.

with Monir. Years later, when she returned to Iran, she found

for well over three decades, and sustaining her through many

wondrous, abstract but hexagonal image, so Monir offers us many

what she now recognised as a native solution to the dryness of

difficult moments. Geometry has always been relied upon by

new, complex, wondrous, abstract hexagonal meditations, hard-

Faced with the challenge of modern Western art, an Iranian

abstract art. It was, as well, a natural — that is, a ready-made,

traditional Islamic culture to manifest, materially, the immaterial

edged to the touch, perhaps, but infinitely satisfying to contemplate.

woman coming of age in the middle of the 20th century might

home-made — solution to the visual meanness of the physical

world, and I was struck anew by Monir’s adherence to this long-

seem disadvantaged. In Tehran the teaching and understanding

reality of Iran.

lived mode of expression. Yet I was also deeply impressed by the

Indeed, whether they are based on the hexagon or upon other

myriad novelties so evident in these new works: by the addition of

geometrical figures, all display some considerable measure of rigour

of 20th-century art was then understandably compromised by conventional fears of outside art and conventional

As with all good solutions, it was a simple one. Monir chose to

colour, which both defines and obscures their complex geometry;

and discipline that goes far beyond the intellectual exercise they

underestimation of native traditions. So how did it all work

make art from imagery that surrounded her every day life in Iran

by the sheer breadth of the geometrical vocabulary demonstrated

seem to offer at first, taking us into other realms that permit the mind

out so well for a talented and energetic young woman, Monir

(Tehran, mostly) and just as importantly, she chose to make art

by so many of them, such as The Two Hexagons, so skillfully cast

to lose itself and the spirit to soar. Mostly executed in glass — one of

Shahroudy Farmanfarmaian?

with those who surrounded her everyday life — the artisans, who

within the rigorous mold of classical Islamic geometrical ornament;

the most ancient of materials but worked in the most modern of

have for centuries striven with their gift of ornament to beat back

and equally by the quite modern feel of others, such as Stars. Being

techniques — and always with the strictest of geometry at their core,

For an aspiring young artist Monir travelled to the right place at

the desert blindness, the true blank expression of nature. So in

accustomed to the prevailing planar quality of her older works, I was

Monir’s recent works all demonstrate a profound connectedness to

the right time — New York City in the 1950s. Rather than having

Monir’s mirrored geometries we recognise a subtle defense of

also struck by the three-dimensionality of her “minaret models”,

some of the most deeply felt aspects of the Muslim vision of the

to struggle with modern versions of representational art, which,

self as we step aside to allow nature to confront its unknowable,

which seem — to me at least — unlike any recorded minarets of

world, in the same way as do many geometrical elements of classical

given the Islamic reticence about figuration was a blessing,

empty self.

Islamic lands and might almost be called “minarets of the mind”.

Muslim architecture: pierced through stucco and stone and marble for window-grilles in the Umayyad Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem,

Monir plunged instead into the world of Abstract Expressionism. Looking back, it appears that it was the abstract part of Abstract

I was also enchanted by a kaleidoscopic quality in so many of

the Nasrid Alhambra in Granada and the window-jalis of Mughal

Expressionism that made the greatest impression on Monir.

Monir’s recent works. In fact, after my first delighted encounter with

India; covering the solid surfaces of bronze or wooden doors from

Perhaps it was only natural that she was drawn to abstract

FRANK STELLA

her recent geometrical explorations of solid colour and reflecting

Mamluk Egypt and Almohad North Africa; spread over the glistening

art. On the face of it, the formalist arguments current at that

New York, 2006

mirror-glass, I realised that it was her variations on the hexagonal

multi-coloured tiled revetments of Seljuk Anatolia and Timurid Central

theme that continue to attract my attention. They must also have

Asia; and throughout the Islamic history of Monir’s own land — in the

appealed to Monir’s aesthetic psyche, for they are so numerous

shining lustred geometry of the interiors of Kashan and Varamin, the

among these recent works, and so wonderfully varied: from the

blue-and-turquoise linear geometry in Sultaniyya, Natanz and Yazd;

immensely complex hexagon at the centre of a larger installation

the floral-patterned geometry of Mashhad and Isfahan; and in the

(see page 32) — the only composition in the opening series that is

layouts of gardens all over Iran.

entirely symmetrical — to the untitled series of larger hexagons with

colour placed against a background of intricately-cut mirror-glass in

ELEANOR SIMS

a pattern of contrasting forms and scale. Sometimes the hexagonal

Editor, Islamic Art, London, 2006 5

The vertical tapering structure conjures memories of the conical towers of mausoleums in south-western Iran such as the tomb of Nabi Daniel, of the stepped pyramidal volume of the Ziggurat at Susa, but also of some brick kilns in vernacular architecture. There is a distinct reminiscence of the crenellations (in Persian, “kongore”), topping the walls of Achaemenid palaces and later recurring in architecture of the of the Islamic period. Souren Chirvani-Malekian

“Ab Rowshana’i” (“Water/Brilliance in Light”), encapsulates the most fundamental theme of Persian culture. “Ab” is the water that flows with the brilliance of a gemstone. Sunlight is thought of as a fountain of sparkles, the “Fountain of Sun” (“Cheshme-ye aftab”) sung in hundreds of verses and celebrated in this metallic fountain. The pyramidal construction of seven receding polygonal platforms rests on two circular bases of decreasing diameter, making up nine levels. These are some of the numbers that recur in Iranian thinking and art from the earliest times, in what I have called “the aesthetic of numbers” in a past essay on the manuscripts of Ayyuqi’s romance, “Varqa and Gulshsa”. Souren Chirvani-Malekian

Top and above: Model and drawing for The Fountain of the Sun (stainless steel, 100cm diameter), 2003-4 Opposite: Glass Sculpture (66×66×25cm), 1977

and she was presented with extraordinary opportunities. Her new

The International Artistic

body of mirror mosaics brought her international exposure. In

Context (1957-1979)

1975, she had her first solo show at the Jacques Kaplan Gallery in New York, which was followed by shows in Brussels (Palais des

Internationally, throughout the 1960s and 1970s the artistic mood

Beaux Arts, 1973); Basel (International Art Fair, 1976); Tehran (Iran-

was expansive, and differing styles ran parallel to each other.

American Society); a first solo exhibition in Paris in April 1977 at the

Although Modernism was the dominant art form in America up to the

prestigious Denise René Gallery, the stage for art construit, and

1960s, the development of Minimalism, with its emphasis on the

another in 1978 at the Denise René Gallery in New York.

three-dimensional and its rejection of traditional composition, elevated process over product and played a major role in challenging

This success came at the time that Farah Pahlavi was starting to

the dominance of painting, while at the same time shifting perceptions

collect international modern art for the Tehran Museum of

of sculpture. As well as Abstract Expressionism25 and Minimalism,

Contemporary Art, which opened in 1977. European “old masters”

there was Pop Art, whose painters incorporated photography and

of modern art (such as Picasso and Matisse) and American artists

commercial graphic design into painting; Op and Kinetic Art; and

— including Andy Warhol, Jackson Pollock, Willem de Kooning,

artists who were more concerned with scale and colour (Rothko,

modern and old hand-coloured glass in her compositions. With her

Mark Rothko and Frank Stella — were acquired by Farah’s

Newman, Noland, Stella). Monir, who continued to visit the USA and

suggestions for new materials and her great curiosity for new ways

representatives, who encouraged dealers and collectors from all

Europe, was aware of these trends, which indirectly influenced her.

of doing things, her inventiveness and practical suggestions

over the world to visit Iran and check the art market. Among these

Also, by the mid-1960s, artists such as Louise Bourgeois (1911-

When the Islamic revolutionaries took power in 1979, Monir was in

Ostad Hajji Mohammad Navid in Monir’s Tehran studio, 1970

Whatever We Had is Gone (felt pen on paper, 40×30cm), 1979

IV A Life’s Work Is Lost (1979-1999)

impressed her own craftsmen. She appreciated their praise more

visitors, the collector Abby Grey not only bought works by Iranian

2010), Yajoi Kusama (b. 1929) and Eva Hesse (1936-1970), found

New York with her husband, visiting her daughter. Their return

highly than the compliments of any leading art critic.

artists but also gave some of them the opportunity to have

an expressive feminist alternative to the cultural language of

became impossible — her husband was both critical of the Shah’s

exhibitions in the United States.

Minimalism, and confronted their past in works that parodied and

regime and the new regime’s religious drive (the Wilayat al-Faqih).

reflected their traumatic experiences.

Together with most of the influential Farmanfarmaian family,

Thoroughly at home with the grammar of decoration, Monir immediately appreciated the originality and craftsmanship of these

Commissions for Iranian artists flooded in. Monir was asked to

masters. She started experimenting with fresh ways of testing new

design several large panels for the Hotel Intercontinental in Tehran;23

In Iran in the early 1960s, the dominant artistic movement was the

Monir and Abol decided to re-establish themselves in exile in New

forms, materials and colours. She exploited tradition, combining

two large mirror murals for the Niyavaran Cultural Centre (1978); a

neo-traditionalist Saqqakhaneh26, as seen in the work of artists

York. Her lifetime’s work and belongings were confiscated and

unusual interwoven patterns with symmetry — the principle of

sculpture for the garden of the Carpet Museum; decorative

such as Zenderoudi, Tanavoli, Pilaram, Arabshahi, Qandriz, and

some of the murals she had created for public venues, such as the

repeating by reflection — to create an overwhelmingly attractive

panels for Queen Farah’s bedroom in the Niyavaran Palace; the

Ovissi, who were later labelled “Spiritual Pop Artists”. These artists

panels in the Intercontinental Hotel, were destroyed. It took her

refurbishment of the Senate reception room; as well as numerous

understood the power of their uniquely Iranian culture, and used

more than a decade to learn that some of her works were safely

other commissions for private houses (which have since been either

votive art — religious folk art that found expression in inscriptions,

stored at the Bonyad-e Mostazafan,27 while others were redistributed

confiscated or destroyed).

talismans and depictions of famous love stories — to create works

to museums and institutions in Iran. Most were sold during the first

a cord or a compass to trace highly complex patterns. After

that could exist in easy dialogue with their counterparts in the

years of the Revolution, at auctions of confiscated goods in the

establishing a structural skeleton with the artist, the mirror workers

commercial centres of Europe and the United States. Although an

Dafineh building.

gave full play to their imagination. Their cord transformed a point

outsider to the Saqqakhaneh group, Monir’s mirror work found its

into a line, circle, triangle, square, hexagon, heptagon, octagon or

niche. Monir was therefore in tune with her contemporaries: the

Galleries in Europe and America that were selling Western artworks

dodecagon, by dividing the circle into a fixed number of segments,

revitalisation of elementary (primal) forms; the structural unfolding

to Iran (and vice versa), also felt the change. Some stopped

and overlaying grids to create a world of interdependent geometrical

of shapes; the integration of cold mirror with warm colour; and the

promoting Iranian artists, as their rich exiled clients no longer

forms, orchestrating motifs that dissolve brilliantly into one another,

contrast of abstract geometrical forms with birds, flowers, and

collected, and the Western market for Iranian art suddenly vanished.

with no beginning and no end.

“drip” paintwork. She was also aware of most of the work by

abstract beauty.

She marvelled at her master craftsmen’s skill, simply using a ruler,

Abolbashar’s house and factories were confiscated within weeks.

contemporary American and European artists.

Having lost her home and a lifetime’s work, Monir felt increasingly

If and when she signed her work, she would put “Monir”, or “Ousta

isolated. For more than a decade, she kept a low profile, socially and

Monir”, playing on the gender ambiguity of her name. Monir felt

By the mid-1970s, an improved infrastructure, better communications,

artistically, accepting just a few private and public commissions28

uncomfortable in taking sole credit for a team accomplishment.

international art biennales, and travelling exhibitions permitted a broad

from clients in New York and Saudi Arabia.

Also, because the works were perceived as decorative, and mostly

intercontinental art discourse. This was the onset of globalisation and

commissioned, she may have felt intimidated by the critique of

an international art market. For a short time, Iranian artists became

The death of her husband from leukemia (1991) came as a terrible

part of that market.

shock. She took refuge in her art, first as a healing process and

intellectual artistic circles. By the 1970s, Monir’s career boomed,

Monir in front of one of her mirror panels, Tehran, 1970s

She came back for longer stays in Tehran in 2003 and 2004,

At the basis of this geometry is the circle, the image of an infinite

and built herself a new apartment. Right away she started

whole, the symbol of eternity. The circle is the ultimate symbol for

looking for her former master mirror worker, Mohammad Hajji

the “origin” and “end” of both geometric and biomorphic form.

She gave a 30-year-old photo of him to a driver, who

From the circle it is possible to generate any regular polygon once

tracked him down and found him alive and still working. Monir

the circumference is divided equally into the required number of

immediately rented a studio in downtown Tehran, and engaged

sections and straight lines join these points of division. When the

assistants who were master mirror workers with decades of

circle is evenly divided, regularly shaped polygons arise, which can

Navid.

in turn be developed into star-shaped polygons, elaborated

They are among the last of the mosaic mirror workers, who feel

indefinitely in perfectly harmonious proportions. These patterns

that the tradition of aineh-kari will soon be lost, as they do not

have infinite possibilities: designs of pentagons, hexagons,

encourage their children to follow in their footsteps. They fear

heptagons, octagons, dodecagons, combinations of stars and

that in the future commissions will be commercial and void of

rosettes or of squares and octagons. Drawing on an elementary

artistic value.

repertoire of motifs, from parallel lines to curves, Monir created

expertise: Ali Asghar Bahrami

Untitled (mixed media on canvas, 350×250cm), 1981, Jeddah Airport, Saudi Arabia

and his brother Reza Bahrami.

stunning new variations.

Dodecagon (mixed media on paper, 100×70cm), 2005

Monir’s come-back encouraged her to recreate some of her lost

later as an energising activity. She worked on small-scale projects

work, but, unable to copy herself, she warmed up with abstract

A lifetime’s learning and experience were rendered into these

of reprocessing, and the urge to exploit the formal potential of

such as watercolours, collages, paintings of flowers, boxes

and drip paintings on glass, adding glitter and mirror mosaics to

works. Once these installations were made, Monir continued with

architectural elements. Monir was also influenced, whether

rediscover the geometrical patterns that she had begun to explore

individual mosaic mirror work, incorporating glass paintings with

consciously or not, by Russian Constructivist principles35 and the

in the 1960s.

stainless steel, a material she had used before. Within a year she

De Stijl movement, in which architecture, furniture and the

produced a magnificent body of work of which any younger artist

decorative arts play an equal part. One can trace a similarity in her

would have been proud.

approach to many Brazilian artists who reinterpreted the tradition

representing “mini theatres of life”,

and models for sculptures

and minarets. These models were mostly based on the superimposition of hexagonal variations. Her collages combined lace and scraps of fabric, sequins and buttons — colourful

For her 2006 exhibition at the Niyavaran Cultural Centre in Tehran,

everyday materials from a feminine world alien to high art. These

Monir has conceived installations of large panels in different colours

of geometric abstraction.36 Her work also seems related to artists

were transformed into highly sophisticated compositions that

— blue (associated with water, purity and infinity), green

such as Piet Mondrian,37 a humanist who, from the 1930s onwards,

imply multiple layers of space and history. But the dimensions of

(representing nature, prosperity and abundance), yellow (symbolic

her work remained small.

of the earth and sunshine) and red (the tradition colour of passion

Monir’s Artistic Legacy

profoundly influenced many industrial and decorative art forms, or Sol Le Witt, who looked at Constructivism through past models

and fire). The panels symbolise every aspect of the universe, and

What motivates Monir most is a non-verbal, visual mode of

and present needs. It is also no accident that the gallery that

Monir also worked with materials that she had never tackled

characterise the timeless and infinite quality of traditional Islamic

communication; the discovery of new forms that can be generated

represented her in the 1970s, Denise René, had already exhibited

before: steel and etchings to illustrate a special edition of Rumi’s

geometric concepts.

from her cultural background to reveal compositions that, while

artists such as Vasarely, Soto, Mondrian, Malevich and Morellet.

externally bound and limited, open inwardly to the infinite.

Monir would not disagree with Ellsworth Kelly, for whom “the found

poems. Then she created a whole series of small boxes bringing

forms in a cathedral vault or in a panel of asphalt on a roadway”

together strangely evocative groups of objects in an enclosed 30

seemed as valuable and instructive as any gallery.

space, “poetic reconstruction of framed memories”, a whimsical

Monir’s main source of inspiration has always been Iran’s ancient

assembly of postcards, photographs, fabrics and objects. Set in

architecture, which embodies the development of aesthetic

a mini theatre, full of imaginative possibilities, they have a sense

precepts and showcases Iran’s highest achievement of decorative

Like many Iranian artists of her generation, Monir’s work is closely

of mystery and nostalgia, and reveal a colourful personal history.

skill. Her choice of media — mirror, plaster and painted glass —

tied to the historical upheavals that affected her country. Just as

reflect her connections with ancient Iran and the craftsmanship of

the Russian revolution of 1917 dispersed the radical Modernist

its unknown artists. In this respect, she stands alone and unique in

pioneers of the Russian avant-garde, and the Second World War

V Monir’s Rebirth as an Artist

the numerous artistic endeavours of the 20th and 21st centuries,

shifted the centre of modern art from Paris to New York, the 1979

(from 2000 to the present day)

which have persistently tried to eliminate artisanal skill and manual

Islamic revolution in Iran created a cultural isolationism that led

virtuosity from both artistic production and aesthetic evaluation.

many artists to leave the country.

After more than a decade in exile, Monir came back to Iran in 1992,

This “de-skilling” appeared for the first time in Impressionist works

and tried to retrace some of her works that she had heard were in

in the late 19th century, and later in Cubist collages and readymades.

Monir is not an academic intellectual and lacks the verbal play of many artist-theoreticians. Yet, she has command over a visual

different public and private collections. Apart from some pieces in the Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art, however, the rest were damaged or missing.

Ali and Reza Asghar Bahrami in Monir’s Tehran studio, 2005

Other influences can be traced from her studies of art history and

vocabulary that many would envy. Her work embodies the balance

from exhibitions in New York. From Pop Art, she inherited the idea

between discipline and freedom, and this balance is both spiritual

Rebirth: Geometric Installations* The harmonious division of a circle is a symbolic way of expressing the Tawhid, the Divine Unity as the source and culmination of all diversity. Titus Burckhart

Detail from Variations on a Hexagon for the Victoria and Albert Museum, London (2006). See pages 140-143.

*The titles of this section are all inspired by Annemarie Schimmelâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s book, The Mystery of Numbers

THE PERFECT NUMBER OF THE CREATED WORLD The hexagon represents the six directions of motion: up, down, front, back, right and left. It also represents the six virtues: generosity, self-discipline, patience, determination, insight and compassion. Installation of Six Elements (mirror, reverse-glass painting and plaster on wood; diameter of circle 100cm), 2004

THE AUSPICIOUS NUMBER Eight is the first cubic number, and also the number of notes in a musical scale. It represents eight qualities: cold; dry; wet; hot; cold-dry; cold-wet; hot-wet; and hot-dry. Installation of Eight Elements (mirror, reverse-glass painting and plaster on wood; diameter of circle 100cm), 2004

THE MAGNIFIED SACRED The nonagon represents the nine elements of the body: brain, bones, nerves, veins, blood, flesh, skin, nails and hair. Installation of Eight Elements (mirror, reverse-glass painting and plaster on wood; diameter of circle 100cm), 2004

Untitled: Variations on a Hexagon (mirror, reverse-glass painting, plaster on wood, 92Ă&#x2014;98cm), 2005

Untitled: From a Triangle to an Octagon (mirror, reverse-glass painting, plaster on wood, 90Ă&#x2014;90cm), 2005

Untitled: Variations on a Hexagon (mirror, reverse-glass painting, plaster on wood, 92Ă&#x2014;98cm), 2005

Untitled: From a Triangle to an Octagon (mirror, reverse-glass painting, plaster on wood, 90Ă&#x2014;90cm), 2005

Untitled (mirror, reverse-glass painting and plaster on wood, 92Ă&#x2014;98cm), 2005

Graduated Squares (mirror, reverse-glass painting, plaster on wood, 90Ă&#x2014;90cm), 2005

Untitled (mirror, reverse-glass painting and plaster on wood, 92Ă&#x2014;98cm), 2005

Graduated Squares (mirror, reverse-glass painting, plaster on wood, 90Ă&#x2014;90cm), 2005

Sculptural Models Hexagonal Variations and Minarets 1976-2003 The sculptural maquettes and projects of Monir Shahroudy Farmanfarmaian illustrate the artistâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s singular approach to geometric pattern and design as she moves from two to three dimensions. Her earliest sculptures in glass identify her artistic legacy and vocabulary â&#x20AC;&#x201C; the fundamental forms of the science of Pythagorean mathematics from the triangle to the octagon. For her more recent sculptures she worked in two dimensions, layering up to five acetates, each based on a different hexagonal pattern. Imagining these figures as lines in space, she constructs maquettes from balsa wood, plastic and aluminium foil into abstract, openwork structures based on the hexagon, a polygon associated with heaven in the Islamic pantheon. While this repeated shape might not be evident in the final design, it is the determining factor. Colour defines the separate forms, each layer of the pattern linked in and through space. Donna Stein, New York 2006

Variations on a Hexagon (mirror, reverse-glass painting and plaster on wood, 50Ă&#x2014;88cm), 2005

Variations on a Hexagon III (coloured styrene strips and Plexiglas, 35×12×50cm), 2002

Variations on a Hexagon IV (coloured styrene strips and Plexiglas, 35×18×50cm), 2002 Opposite: Variations on a Hexagon V (coloured styrene strips and Plexiglas, 35×12×50cm), 2002

Variations on a Hexagon III (coloured styrene strips and Plexiglas, 35×12×50cm), 2002

Variations on a Hexagon IV (coloured styrene strips and Plexiglas, 35×18×50cm), 2002 Opposite: Variations on a Hexagon V (coloured styrene strips and Plexiglas, 35×12×50cm), 2002

Private commission (reverse-glass painting and mirror, 500Ă&#x2014;350cm), Park Avenue, New York, 1983 Opposite page: installation at Farmanfarmaianâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s New York apartment (reverse-glass painting and mirror, 80Ă&#x2014;100cm), 1986

The Pre-1979 Islamic Revolution Works Combining Geometry and Mirror Mosaics 1970-78 Islam’s concentration on geometric patterns draws attention away from the representational world to one of pure forms, poised tensions and dynamic equilibrium, giving structural insight into the workings of the inner self and their reflection in the universe. Keith Critchlow

Monir in her studio in Tehran, working on a sculpture (mirror and reverse-glass on steel, 80cm diameter), 1975 Opposite: Sand-blasted glass doors at the artist’s apartment in New York (200×300cm), 1982

Relief Heptagon (mirror and reverse-glass painting on wood, 100cm diameter), 1977

Relief Octagon (mirror and reverse-glass painting on wood, 70cm diameter), 1977

Relief Hexagon (mirror, reverse-glass painting, plaster on wood, 100Ă&#x2014;130cm), 1976

Relief Heptagon (mirror and reverse-glass painting on wood, 100cm diameter), 1977

Relief Octagon (mirror and reverse-glass painting on wood, 70cm diameter), 1977

Relief Hexagon (mirror, reverse-glass painting, plaster on wood, 100Ă&#x2014;130cm), 1976

Opposite and above: Heart Beat, panel and detail (mirror, reverse-glass painting, plaster on wood, 120Ă&#x2014;90cm), 1975

105

Opposite and above: Heart Beat, panel and detail (mirror, reverse-glass painting, plaster on wood, 120Ă&#x2014;90cm), 1975

105

Untraceable Works 1970-1978 Lillah al baqi (What remains belongs to God) Oleg Grabar

The Magic Numbers (mirror and plaster on wood, mixed media on five layers of glass, 80Ă&#x2014;80cm), 1975

114

Untraceable Works 1970-1978 Lillah al baqi (What remains belongs to God) Oleg Grabar

The Magic Numbers (mirror and plaster on wood, mixed media on five layers of glass, 80Ă&#x2014;80cm), 1975

114

Wall panel for the Bank of Planning Organisation, Tehran (mirror, reverse-glass painting, aluminium, 225Ă&#x2014;225cm), 1976 Opposite: Heptagon Star (mirror and reverse-glass painting on metal on an antique Qajar column base, 160cmH), 1975

118

Above and opposite: The Nightingale, panel and detail (mirror, new and antique reverse-glass painting and plaster on wood, 150Ă&#x2014;60cm), 1969

131

Above and opposite: The Nightingale, panel and detail (mirror, new and antique reverse-glass painting and plaster on wood, 150Ă&#x2014;60cm), 1969

131

Irises (mirror, new and antique reverse-glass painting, and plaster on wood, 80Ă&#x2014;120cm), 1973 Opposite: Daisies (mirror, new and antique reverse-glass painting, and plaster on wood, 70Ă&#x2014;110cm), 1972

132

The Jewels (mirror, vintage silver bedouin jewellery, reverse-glass painting, and plaster on wood, 100Ă&#x2014;100cm), 1974, Collection of the Central Bank, Tehran Opposite: Burak (mirror, new and antique reverse-glass painting, and plaster on wood, 80Ă&#x2014;160cm), 1971

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Variations on a Hexagon for the Victoria and Albert Museum, London Three panels from a six-panel geometric mirror installation (mirror, reverse-glass painting and plaster on wood, 130Ă&#x2014;183cm), 2006

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MONIR SHAHROUDY FARMANFARMAIAN is the only

ROSE ISSA is an independent curator of contemporary

contemporary artist who has explored and combined the use of

visual art and film from Iran and the Arab world. She has

mirror mosaics, Islamic geometric pattern, and old and new

curated exhibitions at several international institutions,

reverse-glass paintings in her modernist artworks. Born in Iran,

including the Barbican Art Centre, Leighton House, and the

she finished her arts education in New York at Parsons School

Brunei Gallery (SOAS) in London; the Haus der Kulturen der

of Design. Her distinct style comes from her strong ties with

Welt in Berlin, IFA (Institut für Auslandsbeziehungen) in

Iran and her New York apprenticeship, which sharpenend rather

Germany; Tropenmuseum in Amsterdam; and the Centre for

than suppressed her sense of cultural identity. Her reputation

Contemporary Culture in Barcelona.

peaked in the 1970s, with major exhibitions in Tehran, Paris and She was a juror for the National Pavilions at the 50th Venice

New York.

Biennial 2003; The Mondrian Foundation, Amsterdam 2006; After the Islamic revorlution of 1979 she took refuge in New

and advised several museums on their contemporary

York, working on commissions, drawings, collages and models.

Middle Eastern and North African acquisitions, including the

Her return to Iran in 2000 represented her rebirth as an artist.

British Museum, the Imperial War Museum and the Victoria &

She is passionately inspired by the craftsmanship and

Albert Museum in London; and the Smithsonian Institution in

aesthetics of her country, which she reinterprets into startlingly

Washington DC.

original modern artworks. Rose Issa has also programmed film seasons for Britain’s Monir’s work is collected by several public institutions in Iran

Channel 4 (“Cinema Iran”), the ICA, Barbican Centre and

(Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art, Niyavaran Palace and

National Film Theatre; collaborated with BBC2 & BBC4, and

Cultural Centre and Saadabad Museum); in the UK (Victoria &

advised the London, Rotterdam and Berlin Film Festivals on

Albert Museum, London); and in America (Chase Manhattan

Arab and Iranian cinema for many years.

Bank, the School of Law at Columbia University and Grey Art Gallery). Private collectors include Jack Kaplan, Denise René, David Rockefeller and Louis Auchinchloss.

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