Behjat Sadr

One of the most pioneer modern artists, Behjat Sadr (1924-2009), was one of the first Iranian women who was active in the international art world. She abandoned the imitation of Iranian art traditions and the repetition of modern Western artists' works. She created her works in the abstract genre; the repetition of parallel lines became the main participle of her artworks. She was an experimental artist who achieved different types of creative experiments in painting, photography, and collage. 

She graduated summa cum laude in painting from the Faculty of Fine Arts. After graduating in 1954, she received a scholarship, traveled to Italy, and continued her studies at the Naples School of Fine Arts and then in the Accademia di Belle Arti di Roma. She was 32 when won the St.Vito's Silver Prize and one of her paintings was accepted in the Venice Biennale 28th edition. Critics described that work as "delicate and post-impressionist". With her teacher's recommendation and introduction, Roberto Melli, Sadr held her first solo show at Pinocchio gallery, this event attracted art critics in 1957. $$quote$$

Studying in Italy had a huge influence on her and she became interested in abstract art. In her abstract paintings, she created circular compositions with spots and colored stripes. From the beginning of her experiments in abstract art, she used thick and black lines which later became the main feature of her works. She came back to Iran and started teaching painting at the Faculty of Fine Arts in 1960. 

She found her own abstract style in the early 1960s. The main distinguished features of her works were the wide vertical and horizontal parallel strips in which the repetition of lines created a harmonious texture. She gradually put aside the painting on the tripod and placed the canvas on the floor. In doing so, her body became more connected to the canvas, and this brought her approach to action painting. 

Because of this innovative and progressive spirit, Behjat Sadr's style was completely different from her contemporaries. Talking about her artworks, she stated that: "Some painters severely want to imitate a certain kind of style; for example, using Iranian elements. This is a kind of prejudice. While I myself as a painter can get influence from my home country, Qashani of the congregational mosque and Isfahan architecture, but do not put them directly into my artworks. It has to depict what can be felt and what comes to the mind". 

Sadr was very interested in the experience of painting; so she also tried painting on wood and aluminum. She poured the paint on the surface and spread or shape it with a spatula. In 1962, jointly with Charles Hossein Zandehroudi, she won the prize of the third Tehran Biennale. She also created two prominent 90-square-meter murals and ceramics for the Hilton Hotel facade. In the same year she was accepted for the second time at the Venice Biennale and the following year she participated in the Sao Paulo Biennale. 

In the late 1960s, she turned to completely new trends in Kinetic art and Op art, which were also popular in Western art at the time. She created abstract compositions on wooden shutters or cloths that were opening and closing. Movements of blades with the help of a motor or a hand and also light and mirror motions would change their structures. She won the UNESCO Award in the Art Competition to Fight Illiteracy for her first artwork in the Shutters series entitled "Light of Knowledge". It was a simple red sun appearing behind a dark curtain. 

The 1980s were a time of new experiences for Behjat Sadr. Due to her illness, it was difficult for her to work on the big canvases; so she put aside large paintings and engaged in photomontage and small-scale photo-painting. She cut out pieces of photographs she had taken and combined them with various elements such as paints. Despite her illness, she did not give up her activity and continued to create these small works until the end of her life. This great artist died in 2009 after enduring several periods of illness.