The Fadjr International Festival of Visual Arts takes place every February, in Iran. Take a look at the video to hear highlights from the Festival and about the state of Iranian art and artists.

The art scene in Iran is dynamic and it has seen the rise of many renowned artists in recent times. One of the events that allows young and thriving artists to showcase their works alongside famous Iranian artists in the Fajr Visual Arts Festival. An art event that is picking up over the years with more and more exhibits going on display.

“Over 19,000 artworks from 6,100 artists from 51 countries entered the festival, from these we chose 990 works from 800 artists to go display and take part in the festival. This art event has achieved a significant turnout this year,” Abbas Mir-Hashemi
Secretary of Fajr Visual Arts Festival said.

The competition was in held in various fields of visual arts from photography to calligraphy and from sculptures to ceramics. As one art connoisseur put it categorizing modern art is itself difficult.

The Director of Tehran’s Museum of Contemporary Arts said, Majid Mulla-Nourouzi
“The visual arts were seeing here is from various fields which we usually see these works in separate expos but here there all together, this is of importance as in modem arts we have many artworks that are in between fields such as video arts and performances.”

Works from renowned artists took part in the non-competitive section of the festival, for the young and thriving the government is trying to help these artists become better known.

Ali Moradkhani, the Deputy for Arts at the Ministry of Culture said, “On part of the government we will try in the coming years to make exemplary works known to collectors and at the same time we will support many of the artists by getting many of these artworks for our collection, so in a way it’s the history of art of this country and at the same time its support artists.”

The judges we talked too mentioned the improving scene in their field of visual arts and the artists themselves were happy with the way the event was held this year.

Artist, Behzad Hajir, said “The difference in this year’s festival compared to before is that in the ceramics section which I took part there are no limitations and if you look at the works on display this is clearly shown.”

While the Fajr festival has come to an end these works of art will be on display in 21 provinces in Iran and in Tehran’s Museum of Contemporary arts during the Nowruz holidays as the country celebrates the Persian New Year.