Arts, Films & Media – Soudavar Memorial Foundation

Derbent: What Persia left behind

Registered as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, the 6th-century Derbent (Darband) fortification complex is considered the largest defensive structure of Sasanian Persia (Iran) in the Caucasus. It is now located in the Republic of Dagestan, the southernmost tip of Russia, where Westerners have been advised against traveling due to the bloody conflict...

Logic of the Birds

This experimental multi-disciplinary theatrical production based on Attar’s Language of the Birds, directed by Shirin Neshat, Shojaz Azari, Ghasem Ebrahimian and featuring the performer Sussan Deyhim, Logic of the Birds was commissioned by Artangel along with Change Performing Arts, The Kitchen, Walker Art Center, and RLG Productions in the Unit...

Atelier d'Ethnomusicologie: 'Festival IRAN, Perles Musicales'

This festival was organised with the scientific and artistic collaboration of Jean During and Mme. Leyli Atashkar. It is conceived to represent the diversity of regional music in Iran with performances of Khorasani, Lori, Turkmen, Baluchi, Azari and mystical Kurdish. After the Geneva performance, the festival was scheduled to tour other locatio...

Lion Tombstones and their Sculptors

Originally conceived as a book, this documentary is about lion tombstones among the Bakhtiari nomads. In the majority of cases it was seasonal stonemasons who mostly made lion tombstones for the Bakhtiari. From their childhood, seasonal stonemasons traveled with their fathers, thus learning the trade at first hand. Generally, they were neither L...

Balouch Voices

The UNESCO Award at the 17th DMZ International Documentary Film Festival, "Balouch Voices" by Muhammad Ehsani delves into the music and culture of the Baluchistan region of Iran. Afro-Iranian music and culture have profoundly influenced the cultural landscape of southern Iran, and Balochi music captures the essence of human experience from birth...

Taq Kasra: Wonder of Architecturee

Taq Kasra: Wonder of Architecture is the first-ever documentary film on the world’s largest brickwork vault in Ctesiphon (near Baghdad in present-day Iraq). . The present ruins are those of the palace built n by the Sasanian Dynasty near the strategic frontier with the Roma Empire. After the Arab invasions of the 7thcentury AD, the imposing rui...