Milad Mahmudi wins first prize at 5th Damonfar Painting Biennial

TEHRAN – Milad Mahmudi won first prize at the 5th Damonfar Painting Biennial, the organizers announced during a ceremony at Tehran’s Mellat Cinema Complex on Friday.  

 

The biennial, which is for artists under 25, is organized by Damonfar, the Iranian representative of France’s Pebeo and Canson, and Germany’s Faber-Castell, three companies that manufacture art materials.

 

The first prize is a trip to Germany to attend courses at the Faber-Castell Creative Academy.

 

Malek Mohammadzadeh won second prize and Elaheh Rezazadeh, Sina Rezaii and Sahar Jamali shared the third prize.

 

The special award in the illustration section went to Nika Bozorgmehr and Hasan Jafari received the choice of the people special award.

 

Fifteen more artists were also honored at the ceremony including Parisa Hossein Hashemi, Saman Hosseinnejad, Narges Baniaqa, Elaheh Farzanegan, Yekta Jebelli, Shima Farahani and Davud Khalili.

 

Veteran painter Aidin Aghdashlu presided over the jury of the Damonfar Painting Biennial this year.

 

Art expert and former director of the Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art Alireza Sami-Azar was next honored with a lifetime achievement award at the closing ceremony.

 

Veteran artist Parviz Kalantari made a brief speech in presenting the award and called Sami-Azar an eternal figure of Iranian art.

 

“Sami-Azar helped Iranian art come out of cultural and political isolation. He opened the window of Iran’s art to the world and encouraged the world to pay due attention to the art of Iran,” Kalantari said.

 

“The biennial is no doubt an important and an independent visual event in the country,” Sami-Azar said in his acceptance speech.

 

Kalantari also had a surprise for the participants, and paid tribute to Damonfar Managing Director Seifollah Puya-Rad for his full support of young artists, and handed him one of his paintings. 

 

In addition, winners of the five previous editions of the biennials were once again honored. They included Vahid Chamani, Morteza Purhosseini, Nafiseh Omran, Adel Yunesi and Leili Rashidi.

 

 

RM/YAW

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