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Iranian movie wins award at Houston festival

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TEHRAN – The Iranian director Ali Kalantari’s debut film “This Film Must Not Be Watched” has won the Platinum Remi Award at the WorldFest-Houston International Film Festival.
 
The film, which was screened in the Experimental Feature section, tells the story of a woman who plans to take revenge on her husband, who has betrayed her. 
 
The Platinum Remi Award is presented to the best film in each section. 
 
Niku Tarkhani, Ehsan Mansuri, Ehsan Amin-Seresh and Ali Kalantari are the main members of the cast for the movie.
 
The 47th edition of the festival was held from April 4 to 13.
 
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UNESCO director-general to visit Isfahan

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TEHRAN -- UNESCO Director-General Irina Bokova will be coming to Iran next week to attend the Isfahan Cultural Week, which will be held from April 23 to 30.
 
Foreign diplomats and a numbers of foreign ambassadors in Iran have also been invited to attend the event, which has been organized by the Isfahan Municipality, Isfahan mayor’s advisor Mehdi Jamalinejad told the Persian service of IRNA on Monday.
 
A vast array of programs has been arranged for the event, which will be covered by a large number of journalists from across Iran, he added.
 
Baha ad-Din Muhammad ibn Husayn al-Amili, the Safavid-era scholar and astronomer who also is known as Sheik-i Bahai, will be commemorated as part of the programs on April 23, which is the National Sheik-i Bahai Day of Sheikh Bahaii.
 
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Watercolor painting in Iran has regressed: artist

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TEHRAN – The Iranian artist Kurosh Aslani has said that watercolor painting has regressed in Iran over the past few years.
 
Various factors have helped the medium of watercolor become obsolete in Iran, Aslani said during the opening ceremony of an exhibition of his watercolors at Tehran’s Shokuh Gallery on Sunday.
 
That is why Iranian gallery owners prefer to hold other types of exhibits, while watercolor has made progress in the countries like Russia, India and Turkey at the same time, he added.
 
Aslani said that his latest works, which are on display at the exhibit, are far from the works created in the classic method by other Iranian artists.
 
“The collection has been created in modern styles to make a better impression on visitors,” he stated.
 
He expressed hope that the watercolor artists who enjoy special styles in their works would unite.
 
Aslani has been working on watercolor for over 20 years and has held several exhibits in Iran and several other countries.
 
The exhibit will be running until April 24 at the gallery, which can be found at 19 Amir Nuri Alley, North Salimi St. near Andarzgu Blvd.
 
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Poster exhibit promoting campaign against decline in Iran’s birth rate underway

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TEHRAN -- A poster exhibition promoting the campaign against the decline in the birth rate in Iran was opened in Tehran on Sunday by former chief nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili.
 
Speaking during the opening ceremony of the “Young Iran” exhibition, Jalili said, “Art is the best and most influential medium for disseminating pure revolutionary principles and thoughts, and sometimes it even achieves better results than political speeches.”
 
“For people like me, who have something to express, it is pleasant to find some people who are able to convey our words in the best and most efficient way,” he added.
 
The exhibition was organized by the People’s Movement for Revolutionary Posters and the Sarcheshmeh Cultural Complex, which is affiliated with the Islamic Ideology Dissemination Organization.
 
“The issue of the social harm of the decline in the rate of population growth is very serious,” Sarcheshmeh Managing Director Hojjatoleslam Mohammadreza Zaeri said at the ceremony.
 
He also stated that official statistics show that the abortion rate has tripled since 1991. According to Zaeri, over 250,000 abortions are officially recorded in Iran every year.
 
“In our society, we are facing some serious problems, for which we once censured the Europeans,” he stated.
 
Iran had been implementing a policy of preventing population growth through birth control for several years until October 2013, when Supreme Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei expressed concern over Iran’s low birth rate and the fact that the population is aging and called for the adoption of measures to encourage Iranians to have larger families.   
 
He asked Iranian scholars to thoroughly study the causes that have made Iranians prefer smaller families and to find ways to encourage them to have more children.
 
The Leader said that there are a number of social issues, such as unemployment, low salaries, and the fact that people are getting married at an older age, which have caused a decline in Iran’s birth rate.
 
“I believe that our country should not be a country of just 75 million people; our country [could be] a country of 150 million people… and even more,” he stated.
 
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Art news in brief

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ICRO assigned to organize intl. section of Tehran Quran exhibition

TEHRAN – The Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance has assigned the Islamic Culture and Relations Organization (ICRO) to hold the international section of the 22nd International Holy Quran Exhibition.

The national and international sections of the exhibition were previously organized by the Culture Ministry.

The exhibition will be held at Tehran’s Imam Khomeini Mosalla from June 23 to July 13.  


Iranian book readers to enjoy D. H. Lawrence’s short stories

TEHRAN – A collection of short stories by the English author D. H. Lawrence has been translated into Persian.

The collection, which will be published by Rozaneh Publications under the title of “The White Stocking and Other Stories”, has been translated Farid Qadami.


Niavaran Cultural Center to host guitar competition

TEHRAN – Classical guitar players from across Iran will come together at Tehran’s Niavaran Cultural Center to participate in a one-day competition on April 25.

Guitarist Keyvan Mirhadi will judge performances by 62 entries in the contest.

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Avaz ensemble to perform in Turkey in late May

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TEHRAN -- Avaz, an ensemble composed of Iranian and Turkish musicians, will be giving concerts in several cities in Turkey late May.

The concerts will begin at the Middle East Technical University in Ankara, the Iranian vocalist Hadi Sepehri told the Persian service of ILNA on Tuesday.

They will next give a performance at the Nazim Hikmet Cultural Center in Istanbul. Following that, the Mekan Hall in Istanbul will host their next performance.

The ensemble will also perform live on Hayat TV, a Turkish nationwide TV channel.

Their last performance will be in Agri, a city located in eastern Anatolia.

Avaz was founded by Sepehri and the Turkish musician Kemal Binici. The ensemble performed in Ankara and several other Turkish cities in 2011, 2012 and 2013.

Vocalist Betul Demir and clarinet virtuoso Ali Fuat Aydin from Turkey and Behrang Nik-Aiin, Mehran Qahramanzadeh from Iran are other members of the ensemble.

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Pottery, calligraphic paintings on display at Saba Institute

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TEHRAN -- Tehran’s Saba Art and Cultural Institute is currently hosting an exhibition of pottery and calligraphic paintings by two artists from Tabriz in the northwestern Iranian province of East Azarbaijan.

New forms of earthenware by Mohammad-Hassan Mehdipur and a collection of calligraphic paintings by Majid Hosseinzadeh have been put on display in an exhibit entitled “Practicing Love with Earth and Line”, Saba announced in a press release on Tuesday.

Mehdipur’s works feature a number of bas-relief-shaped calligraphy works created from earth. He has been working with pottery for the past 40 years.

Hosseinzadeh has brought 20 of his latest calligraphic paintings to the exhibit, which opened on April 21.

Most of the calligraphy works are verses of the Holy Quran.

“I was a student of Master Mohammad Ehsaii. I also learned a lot from Master Jalil Rasuli,” Hosseinzadeh said.

“However, I practiced thulth, a calligraphic variety of Arabic script, in Istanbul for two years and next traveled to Iraq to continue with thulth,” he added.

The exhibit will be running until April 28 in the the institute located on Mozaffar St., off Taleqani Ave., near Felestin Square.

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IRIB will lift ban on “Ancient Land” after modification: official

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TEHRAN -- The Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting (IRIB) will lift the ban on “Ancient Land” after some modifications are made to the docudrama, IRIB Deputy Director Ali Darabi said on Tuesday.

Directed by Kamal Tabrizi, the series is about historical events that occurred in Iran in the aftermath of the Allied occupation of the country during World War II.

IRIB’s Channel 3 began broadcasting the series in early January. However, the IRIB stopped broadcasting the docudrama in early February following a protest from large groups of Bakhtiaris in several cities in southwestern Iran. They claimed the series insulted Bakhtiaris by linking a Bakhtiari family to the Iranian monarchy and calling them British occupiers’ agents.

“Officials from Channel 3 and members of the production team of ‘Ancient Land’ are scheduled to hold sessions in the near future to decide about the modifications of the series,” Darabi told the Persian service of MNA.

Tabrizi previously said, “Making a judgment about the good and bad characters of the series requires patience and time.”
 
Tabrizi and a number of his colleagues also wrote a letter to IRIB Managing Director Ezzatollah Zarghami, briefing him on the story of the TV series.
 
“Undoubtedly, the producers of the serial meant no disrespect to the honorable Bakhtiari people. The coming episodes of the series will prove this fact. However, we offer our apologies if any of the early parts of the serial caused harm to our Bakhtiari compatriots,” they said.


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Tehran gallery asks male, female artists to paint their impressions of opposite gender

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TEHRAN – Tehran’s Shila Gallery has called upon a number of eminent Iranian male and female painters to express their impressions of the opposite gender by means of their works, which will be put on display in separate exhibitions entitles “In the Other’s Eyes” .
 
The first exhibition, which will be held from May 1 to 13, is dedicated to male artists, curator Ali Nedaii told the Persian service of ISNA on Saturday.
 
Dariush Hosseini, Mehrdad Khataii, Ali Zakeri, Farshid Shafiei, Kaveh Kavusi and Ahmad Nadalian are among seventeen male artists who have participated in this art project.
 
The female artists will display their works afterwards.
 
The gallery is located at 2 Gilan Alley, off Vali-e Asr Ave., near Taleqani Ave.  
 
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“The Theft” wins awards at Serbian festival

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TEHRAN – The Iranian short film “The Theft” has won two awards at the Prokuplje Short Film Festival in Serbia.
 
The film received the awards for best fiction film and audience favorite film of the festival, which was held on April 23 and 24.
 
Directed by Mohammad Farahani, the six-minute silent film is about an elderly woman who is accused of theft.
 
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Tehran City Council to investigate Tanavoli museum row

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Tehran -- The director of the Art Committee of the Tehran City Council Abdolhossein Mokhtabad has said that the committee will assign a team to investigate the dispute between sculptor Parviz Tanavoli and the Tehran Municipality over converting Tanavoli’s residence into a museum for his works.
 
Mokhtabad made the remarks during a meeting with Tanavoli at his home in Tehran, the Persian service of ISNA reported on Saturday.
 
Based on an agreement signed between Tanavoli and the Tehran Municipality in 2003, he transferred the ownership of his 58 sculptures and his house in northern Tehran to the municipality on the condition that the house would be converted into a museum for his works.
 
However, the municipality announced later that the plan to establish the museum has been cancelled.
 
Tanavoli filed a lawsuit and six years later the court ruled that the house was to be returned to him.
 
According to Tanavoli, the municipality refused to return his sculptures, some of which allegedly have been sold. 
 
In addition, an unknown group along with a number of personnel from the police forces broke into Tanavoli’s house and took a number of his works in mid March using a crane and a truck.
 
The artworks are being kept at the Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art until the suit is settled, ISNA reported on April 16.
 
Mokhtabad expressed his regret over the incident and said the committee will pay special attention in its investigation into the issue.
 
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UNESCO director-general, Iranian foreign minister open exhibition of historical maps

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TEHRAN -- UNESCO Director-General Irina Bokova and Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif opened an exhibition of a collection of historical maps in Tehran on Saturday.
 
Iranian officials and foreign diplomats also attended the opening ceremony of the “Maps from the Qajar Period” exhibition at the Institute for Political and International Studies (IPIS).
 
The collection, dating back to the 19th century, was registered on UNESCO’s Memory of the World Register list in June 2013.
 
In address at the ceremony, Bokova said that UNESCO is making the utmost efforts to preserve the world’s cultural and historical documents.
 
She expressed gratitude to the Iranian Ministry of Foreign Affairs for its activities in the preservation of cultural heritage and thanked the Iranian experts who helped restore the rare collection.
 
Zarif said that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs possesses a priceless collection of documents, a small part of which has been registered on the UNESCO list.
 
The collection “Maps from the Qajar Period” consists of 500 unique hand-drawn and lithographic geographical maps that are kept at the Center for Documentation and Research Services of the Iranian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
 
Most of the collection consists of maps of Iran and nearby regions. Some of the maps show the territories that have been separated from Iran over the centuries as a result of political events. And some of the maps bear the signatures of officials and political and cultural figures of the time in the margins.
 
Bokova arrived in Tehran on Friday. She is scheduled to travel to Kerman Province to visit the Bam Citadel.
 
She will also visit Pasargadae, the first dynastic capital of the Achaemenid Empire, and the mausoleums of Hafez and Sadi in Fars Province, and the Chehel Sotun Palace and Naqsh-e Jahan Square in Isfahan during her sojourn in Iran.
 
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IIDCYA unveils Spanish versions of 23 Iranian children’s books

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TEHRAN –Spanish translation of 23 Iranian children’s books were unveiled during a ceremony at the Institute for the Intellectual Development of Children and Young Adults (IIDCYA) in Tehran on Saturday.
 
The books have been released by the Fanus-e Daryaii Publications in Qom. 
 
Several diplomats from the Spanish Embassy in Tehran and a number of Iranian cultural officials and literati attended the unveiling ceremony.
 
Persian versions of eight titles of the series had previously been published by the IIDCYA.  
 
“Kind like Christ” written by Mahmud Javanbakht, “The Ice that Falls in Love with Sun” by Reza Mozuni, “In Search of God” and “The Most Honest Friend” by the Tehran-based French writer Claire Jobert are some of the books. 
 
“Coins of Victory” by Mostafa Rahmandust, “From That House to Another One” by Gholamreza Heidari-Abhari and “Not out of Grief” by Ahmad Arablu are also among the offerings.
 
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Art news in brief

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Tehran Peace Museum to host anti-war poster exhibition 
 
TEHRAN – The Tehran Peace Museum will put a collection of anti-war posters by Iranian artist Behnaz Nik-Khah Monfared on display in an exhibition from April 29 to May 7.
 
The exhibition has been organized to commemorate April 29, which the Day of Remembrance for all Victims of Chemical Warfare.
 
 
Pop singer Shahram Shokuhi to give concert in Dubai
 
TEHRAN – Iranian pop singer Shahram Shokuhi will be giving a concert at the Dubai Community Theater and Arts Center on May 11.
 
He will perform songs from his albums “Gipsy of Love” and “Tolerance”.
 
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“Painting Pool” to go on screen at Shanghai festival

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TEHRAN – Iranian director Maziar Miri’s family drama “The Painting Pool” will compete in the 17th Shanghai International Film Festival, which will be held from June 14 to 22.
 
Starring Shahab Hosseini and Negar Javaherian, the acclaimed film is about a boy named Soheil, who has a problem with his physically challenged parents.
 
“The Painting Pool” has won the UNESCO Award at the seventh annual Asia Pacific Screen Awards (APSA) in December 2013.
 
The film also shared the Crystal Simorgh for Audience Favorite Film at the Fajr International Film Festival in Tehran in February 2012.
 
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Afghanistan to be guest of honor at Tehran Book Fair

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TEHRAN -- Afghanistan will be the guest of honor at the 27th Tehran International Book Fair (TIBF), which will be held from April 30 to May 10.
 
A large group of Afghan publishers and literati has been invited to the event, TIBF Director Seyyed Abbas Salehi, who is also the deputy minister of culture for cultural affairs, said in a press conference on Sunday.
 
After Iran, Afghanistan is the only Persian-speaking country that has Persian orthography, TIBF Deputy Director for Cultural Affairs Mohammad Allahyari said during the conference.
 
“Despite the large number of Afghan refugees in Iran, Iranians do not have much familiarity with Afghan culture,” he added.
 
The TIBF is a great opportunity for Iranians to better understand Afghans’ capacity, he stated.
 
Publishers from Germany, France, Turkey, Japan, Lebanon, Syria, China, Qatar and several other countries will be presenting about 160,000 their latest offerings at the TIBF. 
 
Salehi said that the TIBF will improve facilities for visitors and publishers this year.
 
The organizers have also arranged open-air theatrical performances and some other cultural programs.
 
The 27th Tehran International Book Fair will be held at Tehran’s Imam Khomeini Mosalla.
 
Cultural exchanges, translation, copyright and several other subjects will be discussed at meetings on the sidelines of the fair.
 
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“Minus 30” opens Tehran Graphic Design Week

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TEHRAN – The Tehran Graphic Design Week opened at the Iranian Artists Forum on Sunday with a display of posters by a group of young artists in an exhibition entitled “Minus 30”.
 
Works by 168 graphic designers aged less than 30 and all coming from across Iran have been put on show at the exhibit, the forum reported in a press release on Sunday.
 
All the works on display have been selected by a jury panel including Qobad Shiva, Majid Abbasi, Alireza Mostafazadeh and Tahereh Mohebbi.
 
A solo exhibition displaying works by veteran graphic designer Abbas Saranj has also been set up, while an honoring program has been arranged on the sidelines of the exhibit.
 
In addition, a selection of works by German graphic designer Fons Matthias Hickmann (born 1966) has been put on display in an exhibition on the side section.
 
Hickmann is a professor of communication design at the Berlin University of the Arts. He founded “Fons Hickmann M23” studio which focuses on the design of complex communication systems.
 
The exhibit will be running for one week in the forum located on Musavi St., off Taleqani Ave.
 
The weeklong program has been organized by the Iranian Graphic Designers Society under the auspices of the International Council of Graphic Design Associations (Icograda) to celebrate April 27, which is World Graphic Design Day.
 
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Iranian company, Metropolitan Museum publish rare copy of Shahnameh

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TEHRAN -- “The Shahnama of Shah Tahmasp”, a rare copy of the epic masterpiece of Ferdowsi, the Shahnameh (The Book of Kings), has recently been published by New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Vijeh Nashr Company, an Iranian publisher that imports English and Arabic books published by foreign publishers.
 
Vijeh Nashr has released copies of the book, which previously had been published by Yale University Press, at the 25th Tehran International Book Fair in May 2012.
 
“The (Yale) edition was warmly received and all copies were sold out at the exhibition,” Vijeh Nashr Managing Director Ahad Rezaii told the Persian service of IRNA on Saturday.
 
“Therefore, our company and the Metropolitan Museum of Art have prepared a new edition with some additional materials,” he added.
 
The company plans to offer copies on “The Shahnama of Shah Tahmasp” at the 27th Tehran International Book Fair, which will be held from April 30 to May 10.
 
“The Shahnama of Shah Tahmasp”, also known as the Shahnama-ye Shahi, is one of four historical copies of Ferdowsi’s epic masterpiece.
 
The edition was commissioned by the Safavid king Shah Tahmasb in the early 17th century.
 
An Islamic art expert at Oxford’s Ashmolean Museum of Art and Archaeology, Francesca Leoni, wrote that the book “is arguably the most luxuriously illustrated copy of Ferdowsi’s epic ever produced in the history of Persian painting.” 
 
“Its pages, with generous measurements for an illustrated book (approximately 48x32 cm), are made of fine paper enriched with large gold-embellished borders and lavish illuminations. Accompanying the 759 folios of text, written in superb nastaliq script, are 258 paintings of exquisite quality and artistic originality.
 
“Not long after its completion, the manuscript left Iran and was sent as a gift on the occasion of the accession of the Ottoman sultan Selim II (r. 1566–74)… Until the early twentieth century, the manuscript remained in the library of the Topkapi Palace, Istanbul, where it continued to entertain generations of rulers… Today the manuscript is dispersed among private and public collections. The Metropolitan Museum has seventy-eight of the pages with paintings in its collection.”
 
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Iran’s Leila Hatami on Cannes panel

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Tehran Leila Hatami, the star of the Oscar-winning Iranian drama “A Separation”, has been selected for the jury of the 67th Annual Cannes Film Festival, the organizers announced on Monday.
 
The New Zealand director, producer and screenwriter Jane Campion, winner of the Palme d’Or for “The Piano”, will preside over the jury.
 
French actress Carole Bouquet; the American director, screenwriter and producer Sofia Coppola; South Korean actress Jeon Do-yeon; the American actor Willem Dafoe; the Mexican actor, director and producer Gael Garcia Bernal; the Chinese director, screenwriter and producer Jia Zhangke; and the Danish director, screenwriter and producer Nicolas Winding Refn are the other members of the panel.
 
France’s Ministry of Culture and Communication honored Hatami in August 2012 with Ordre des Arts et des Lettres, which is granted to eminent artists, writers and scholars for their efforts in promoting the awareness and enrichment of France’s cultural heritage throughout the world.
 
She was crowned best actress at the 47th Karlovy Vary International Film Festival in the Czech Republic in July 2012 for her role in “The Last Step”, which was directed by her husband Ali Mosaffa.
 
She was on the jury of the 37th Deauville American Film Festival, which took place in France in September 2011.
 
The 67th Annual Cannes Film Festival will be held from May 14 to 25.
 
The world-renowned Iranian filmmaker Abbas Kiarostami will preside over the Cinéfondation and Short Films jury of the Cannes festival this year.
 
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“All the Winters” to compete in Montreal filmfest

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TEHRAN – The Iranian animation “All the Winters I Haven’t Seen” will go on screen at the 37th Montreal World Film Festival, which will be held in Canada from August 21 to September 1.

Directed by Omid Khoshnazar, the 17-minute animation set in New York City tells the story of a pregnant woman who discovers that there is a high likelihood her child will be born with severe physical defects due to her exposure to chemical weapons.

She is forced to choose between giving birth to a child who will likely be severely handicapped or aborting the baby and giving up any hope of ever having a child.

The goal of the festival is to encourage cultural diversity and understanding between nations and to promote filmmakers and innovative works.

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