Aydin Aghdashloo

Aydin Aghdashloo
Aghdashloo in 2003
Born	Aydin Aghdashloo (1940-10-30) October 30, 1940 (age 76) Rasht, Iran
Nationality	Iranian
Other names	Faramarz Kheybari
Alma mater	University of Tehran
Occupation	Painting, Art history, Art criticism, Graphic design, Film criticism, Writing
Works	Termination Memories Falling Angels Identity: In Praise of Sandro Botticelli
Home town	Rasht, Tehran
Spouse(s)	Shohreh Aghdashloo (1972–1979) Firouzeh Athari (1981–present)
Children	Tara (from Firouzeh Athari) Takin (from Firouzeh Athari)
Honours	Legion of Honour
Website	http://www.aghdashloo.com/

Aydin Aghdashloo (Persian: آیدین آغداشلو‎‎; born October 30, 1940) is an Iranian painter, graphist, writer, film critic and one of the known artists of Iranian modern and contemporary art. His art works are known for showing the thought of gradual death and doom and also recreating remarkable classic works in a modern and surrral form. His two series Termination Memories and Years of Fire and Snow are considered part of the most important series of modern Iranian art.

Aghdashloo began designing, graphics and painting since adolescence and became the painter of Iranian textbooks, magazines and private institutions in youth. For a while, he directed the cultural and artistic affairs of "Special Office of Queen Farah Pahlavi" and helped collecting Iranian and global artworks. He was also involved in launching Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art and Reza Abbasi Museum, and directed the latter for a while. After the revolution, Aghdashloo is considered one of the most famous painting masters for the third generation modern Iranian painters.

As of now, Aghdashloo has held two individual exhibitions in Iran. The first one was at Iran-America Society in Tehran on 1975 and the second one in November 2014. In addition to several modern paintings, he has hundreds of writings including art and film criticism, research about the history of art, and travel literature.

Aydin Aghdashloo, son of Mohammad-Beik Aghdashloo (Haji Ouf) and Nahid Nakhjevan, was born on October 30, 1940 in the Afakhray neighborhood of Rasht, Iran. His father was a Caucasian-Azerbaijani and a member of the Equality Caucasian Party and his family assumes their surname from the small town of Aghdash. After the retake of Caucasus by Bolshevik forces, they started arresting and killing members of the Equality Party on Lenin's orders and Mohammad-Beik was forced to pass the Aras river on horseback at night and seek refuge in Iran. He was educated and knew multiple languages. After entering Iran and employment at the Ministry of Roads, though he had much engineering activity, he became ill as a reault of depression caused by losing properties and distance from birthplace and died at Aydin's 11 years of age (1951) as a result of tuberculosis. Although Aydin does not remember a lot of memories of Mohammad-Beik, the former has remarked the latter's interest in Ferdowsi's Shahnameh, Eugene Onegin, designing and reading. Aydin's maternal family was thoroughly from Qajar dynasty. After seeing Aydin's talent in painting at school and his hand-made models, Mohammad-Beik took him to Habib Mohammadi, a painter and a teacher from Rasht. According to Aydin, while meeting Mohammadi, Bahman Mohasses was also in the room and the two were busy discussing a painting about the Battle of Plataea. Afterwards, Aghdashloo went to Tehran with Nakhjevan and they settled at his aunt's house. In Tehran and at home, Aghdashloo spoke Azerbaijani with Nakhjevan, and at education place, Persian and English. That was the time he entered the Jam high school in the Gholhak neighborhood on 1953 and became classmates with Abbas Kiarostami and Ali Golestaneh there.