Reza Derakshani, (Iran, born 1952)

Hunt the Colour

Hunt the Colour
oil, acrylic, gold-leaf and mixed media on canvas
signed and dated 2016 on the verso
150 x 180cm (59 1/16 x 70 7/8in).

Provenance:
Property from a private collection, Norway

"I had to develop my own original language. I took the
improvisational aspects of my music and applied
it to painting to make sense of these principles
– which worked very well. Persian music is
essentially abstract though it is subjugated to
certain mathematical principles and rules. In
painting I was able to eliminate these constraints
by focusing on what emerges unexpectedly
depending on the emotionality of the moment
– there are no boundaries - just building up,
deforming and reforming. Of course in exile
one nurtures certain notions of nostalgia and,
if not consciously, one wants to assert ones
identity. After all, I had been involved with
Persian culture since I was very young, and many
of my famous series – were conceived when I
was still abroad, perhaps through
the eyes of a diasporic romantic digging in the
archive of his beloved Persian cultural heritage."

- Reza Derakshani