Photographer Sara Shamsawari exhibits a selection from her series in City Hall entrance until January 4th.
The exhibition is a series of engaging portraits around the symbolism of the union jack with all its connotations. The photos are accompanied by statements and both promote a questioning of our ideas of what it means to be British now.
Venturing around Iran and Afghanistan with a copy of the Shahnameh tucked under his arm, Nicholas Jubber relates what this pivotal introduction taught him about modern people who still love this medieval text.
Jubber explains how The Shahnameh, or Persian Book of Kings, is still very much alive today for many people, even 1000 years after it’s completion.
His book certainly has it’s own style and he visited the Resonance104.4FM studios to explain certain points: from beards to butchers to free motorbikes.
This show was originally broadcast on 2nd August, 2010
Sanaz Raj discusses her interest in Iranian film and a week of full length film screenings running in conjunction with the Leeds International Film Festival. The week, called the Iranian Diasporic Film Series presents a variety of film: from a documentary about the Shah’s widow to a fiction about a lesbian refugee from Iran who takes on the identity of a dead male acquaintance.
Sanaz and Fari discuss the screenings and accompanying talks, as we well as ‘Certified Copy‘ Abbas Kiarostami’s latest film set in Italy, starring Juliette Binoche.
Amnesty’s Iran researcher Drewery Dyke talks about Amnesty’s new initiative for Iran, launched with a new study into detainees and prisoners in Iran. we also hear from Ashram Parsi of the Iranian Railroad for Queer Refugees. Many thanks to South Leeds Community Station for this interview.
This show also includes a dramatisation of the Iranian Folk Tale “The Great Hunter”, produced by Fari Bradley with members of Cool Tan Arts Southwark.
An interview with Shirley Elghanian from Magic of Persia.
Magic of Persia Contemporary Art Prize finalists exhibit in London this month, as do the artists involved in the Iran Unbowed exhibition which Magic of Persia have curated to coincide with the Frieze Art Fair.
With luminaries such as Abbas Kiarostami on board and Sheena Wagstaff chief curator of the Tate, Magic of Persia works to promote Iranian arts and culture outside of Iran.
This interview was broadcast live from the Resonance 104.4FM studios on October 5th 2009.
Famous for serving six balls at once on a professional court, under arm serves, and speciality shots including the ‘power shot through the legs’, ‘the lob through the legs’ and ‘the drop shot’ which bounces back over the net due to excessive backspin tennis impresario Mansour Bahrami is not to be matched. At the launch of his book he talks about his extraordinary rise to stardom via homelessness in France and the singularly harsh treatment he received as a child on the tennis courts in Iran.
BIBA (The British Iranian Business Association) organised the evening in Summer 08 as part of their public service programming. Fari Taydayon from The Energy Deployment Company and Bez Ghazian review the event at the Hilton where Bahrami was speaking.
The show features classical music played by Haydn Dickenson: piano imitates and transcends santoor in the ten minute piece ‘Tariq 1″ from the album ‘East’.
When five young men who are a typical modern concoction of traditional Iranian values and MTV play music together what will it sound like?
Simorgh is the name of a mystical bird in Sufi folklore. As a band of young urbanites however, their music incorporates group chanting and a lyrical poetry that is folk-rap, accompanied by the evocative ney flute, tar strings and the empty bellow of the daf drum. This alluring mixture is – as far as our experience shows – at it’s optimum best when seen live, so we brought them into the studio to whip up some of that tribal feeling we’ve come to associate their performances with.
Fari Bradley talks to the five members of the band about leaving university, playing football, parents, Bryan Adams and musical instruments as weapons of culture.
Simorgh run workshops for the BBC on Iranian music and put on their own concerts around London. With their own unique melange of influences, the band stand for something many of us can comprehend: what it’s like to be a cultural cocktail in London now.
This programme was originally broadcast from the Resonance104.4fm studios on July 21st 2008.
Two small travel companies explain the ins and outs of travelling to Iran. From dry sand skiing to Zoroastrian tours, there is a lot on offer!
Persian Voyages and Magic Carpet Travel share anecdotes and histories, as well as tips for those considering leaving.
This programme was originally broadcast on Resonance 104.4fm in London, on July 14th 2008
Photographer Jamshid Bayrami shows his works in ‘Haj’, the opening exhibition at Xerxes Fine Arts Gallery in London, the only permanent gallery dedicated to Iranian art.
Bayrami has worked successfully as a photo journalist and is known for his picture of a bloodied hand print on a T-shirt during student protests that appeared on the front of The Economist magazine. Following three days of bloodshed at Tehran University in July 1999, the subject of the picture Ahmad Batebi was given a 13-year prison sentence. Bayrami’s work continues to be frank and sincere, yet has taken on some very subtle tones as he moves into the realm of art for this exhibition.
Here Fari Bradley talks to gallery owner and curator Ali Bagherzadeh, who is himself a collector, about the show and its pieces.
This show was originally broadcast from the Resonancefm studios on July 7th 2008
Fari Bradley reports from the Contemporary Iranian Music event at the Camden Underworld and interviews artist Maria Kheirkhah live in the studio about her career choice to become an artist, collecting air in the Iranian desert and her current exhibition the Psychology of Fear. Featured are Farinaz Entegham, Ali Charmi on hip hop and faith, and the father of one of the members of Simorgh.
(pictured: Maria Keirkhah collects hot desert air for her show)
Most Iranian parents want their children to be lawyers or doctors, so how do aspiring musicians fare with their parents when making out-of-the-ordinary career choices. Also what does contemporary music mean to most young Iranians? We’ve heard the desperate eurodance trash that most clubs advertise as Persian music, and other than that there is only Dylan-esque songs and traditional music to choose from in the main. Rightly, some UK based Iranians are fusing the traditional forms and instruments with modern concerns, with a vocal delivery that compares with rapping under the moniker Contemporary Iranian for the event and Simorgh for their group. Simorgh are also promoting other new musicians such as rapper Farinaz Entegham (Holland) and Reveal (UK).
This show was originally broadcast from Resonancefm studios in London on June 16th 2008, produced and presented by Fari Bradley
