فارسیKourosh Shishegaran (born 1945, Qazvin) is a contemporary Iranian painter, graphic designer, printer, and interior architect, and one of the prominent figures of modern and contemporary Iranian art.
He received his painting diploma in 1967 from the Tehran Boys’ Fine Arts Academy and his bachelor’s degree in interior architecture in 1973 from the Faculty of Decorative Arts, Tehran University of Art, and began his professional career in the early 1970s.
His first solo exhibition was held in 1972 at the Mes Gallery in Tehran, an exhibition that reflected his populist approach to presenting his works. In this exhibition, all works were donated to the public and public institutions rather than sold, an approach that reflected his belief in expanding the direct connection between art and everyday life.
In the 1970s, Shishegaran was particularly active in the field of graphic and poster design using silkscreen printing, and at the same time pursued diverse experiences in the field of reproduction, presentation, and expansion of artistic mediums.
Since 1976, he has designed and executed numerous posters and graphic works on social and political issues, which have been displayed throughout the city and exhibitions have been held of them.
One of the most notable works of this period is the poster “Peace for Lebanon” (1976), for which he received a certificate of appreciation from the United Nations. He also expanded the boundaries between the artwork, the exhibition space, and the audience by presenting Enghelab Street as a living work of art and reproducing the works of prominent Iranian and international artists with personal expression.
The first foreign exhibition of glassmakers was held in 1976 in the city of Basel, Switzerland, and in 1977, a collection of 52 volumetric works derived from everyday objects was exhibited.
From around 1983, Kourosh Shishegaran’s artistic path shifted seriously towards line-based abstract paintings; works that have continued for more than three decades and have become his visual signature. In these paintings, he presents an abstract image of man and the contemporary world, relying on fluid and striped lines; where figures are formed not as external representations, but as a possibility for expressing the inner and symbolic layers of man. Fast, improvised, and energetic movements of the pen play a fundamental role in the formation of this visual language.
In the most stable period of the glassmaker’s work, the “act of drawing lines” as an instinctive and ancient behavior for the discharge of emotions becomes the main focus of his works. Wavy, restless and endless lines, regardless of the starting or ending point, move freely on the surface of the canvas and create graphic and rhythmic spaces in the midst of their twists. In these works, rather than a specific image or form dominating the painting, the fluid movement of soft, curved lines with high energy and dynamism prevails; a quality that has become one of the recognized characteristics of contemporary Iranian art and the visual signature of glassmakers.
The glassmakers’ works are based on recognizing the graphic and visual potential of striped lines and intertwined figures, and they recreate an abstract, suspended, and meaningless world. Although sometimes objects or faces appear clearly in these spaces, they, like abstract elements, are an excuse for exploring the values of form, color, and movement, and ultimately serve the artist’s line-based and fluid language.
Art critic Javad Mojabi considers Shishegaran’s paintings to be works that “stand between music and architecture”; fluid compositions with colorful lines that, like a piece of music, possess rhythm, movement, and polysemy, and oscillate between building and not building.
Kourosh Shishegaran’s works have been exhibited in numerous solo and group exhibitions in Iran and abroad, and in events such as the First Iranian Painting Biennial, the Ninth Asian Art Biennial, the Beijing World Biennial, and the Islamic World Biennial. In addition to receiving a United Nations certificate of appreciation, he has won first place in the Millennium World Painting Competition in Iran and received the jury’s commendation for the First International Painting Biennial of the Islamic World. The continuous presence of his works in prestigious exhibitions, biennials, and collections has established his position as one of the influential artists of contemporary Iranian art.
A book of his works was published by Saqi Publications in 2016.