Iranian Artists Forum (IAF) hosted a session yesterday, June 11, on India's visual arts. During the session, Behnam Kamrani introduced and praised some Indian contemporary artists saying in spite of the similarities of Iran and India's artistic society, Iran fails to hold a proper research book on introducing India's contemporary artists and arts.

IBNA: The halls and galleries of the Iranian Artists Forum is playing host to Iran-India Culture Week during which a series of sessions are being held on Indian cultural and artistic issues.

The center held a session yesterday, June 11, on India's visual arts which was attended by Behnam Kamrani and Nahid Abdi.

During the session Kamrani introduced and analyzed works of the "Veterans of India's contemporary arts" and displayed some of the works. He said:" I will mostly speak about vanguard Indian artists; since India's contemporary art isn’t familiar."

He added:" During the times Britain ruled over India, many scholars emphasized on intellectual and cultural autonomy, including the noted artist Rabindranath Tagore."

He then introduced some other artists including "Sher-Gil", "M.F.Hussain", "Riyas Komu" and "T.V.Santhosh" and displayed some of their works. Talking about M.F.Hussain he said:" He was a national hero in India. His works and lifestyle has, indeed, influenced many other Indian contemporary artists and arts. His name was included in the list of the 500 Most Influential Muslims in the World. He painted around 60000 paintings in his entire life."

He went on to say that Indian modernist and contemporary artists are highly inspired by the Indian identity and its legends and folklore. Compared with the Iranian artists, they enjoy more followers and customers.

Kamrani criticized the lack of a book introducing India's contemporary arts in Iran and said:" Issues related to contemporary eastern artists- Chinese, Indian and Japanese- are similar to Iranian ones; thus their experiences can be handy in Iran but unfortunately, considering Iran-India's artistic and cultural commonalities, no Persian books have been penned about India's modern art."

Surprisingly I should say that we even fail to have a book about Indian Mongolian art and the deficiency exists about Japan and China's modern art as well; however I should say that the field of modern Iranian art also holds less books, he added.

In other news, Nahid Abdi talked about Taj Mahal presenting the building's history as well as its pictures and related historical figures.

She then talked about the building's Iranian symbols and elements saying many researchers believe that Taj Mahal holds Iranian roots. The building merges Iranian, Zoroastrian, Hindu and Islamic legends.

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