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From the early years of artistic activities on Hormoz Island and later in Qeshm villages, Ahmad Nadalian taught drawing and painting to women and girls who have no income. He also teach men who suffered from addiction. He encouraged talented individuals to engage in drawing. Often this type of work began by providing them with drawing paper, pencils colours and brushs. They usually draw childlike and primitive sketches. Nadalian make come changes to their drawings and use them to paint on canvas.
Nadalian also collaborated with men and women on many joint paintings in Hormoz and Qeshm villages. He would first create a colored background. The men or women invited to participate make drawing. He would modify some parts and work on them.
Another type of joint works by Ahmad Nadalian involved selecting objects that were often considered trash. He would ask women to paint flowers on them. The final results were displayed as installations in his museums and galleries in Hormoz, Laft, and Tehran. After years of work, the local community believe that Nadalian can chose any trash transformed them into art.
What was the aims of these works?
Revealing hidden potential in ordinary people and turning them into artists
Nadalian’s first goal was to show that even people living on a remote border island in marginalized neighborhoods, who weren’t taken seriously by anyone in their society, could be creative and artist. The famous quote by German artist Joseph Beuys was “Everyone is an artist.” Although this statement has caused some misunderstanding. It doesn’t necessarily mean that everyone can be a painter or photographer, but rather he believed that creativity lies within humans. People can be creative like artists in their chosen work paths. Does Joseph Beuys’s claim apply to people of all societies? Nadalian believes that contemporary artists can play a role in making unknown individuals into artists. He brought many people from the margins to the art scene. Now many of them feel empowered and introduce themselves as artists.
Bridging the gap between marginalized people and intellectuals
Using raw and primitive drawings, Nadalian tried to reduce the distance between a marginalized community and intellectual spaces. He sought to achieve art that was primitive, imaginative, strange, and appealing to art and intellectual spaces. The sketches of talented but untrained individuals are pure. This type of primitiveness comes from within and cannot be taught. In community-baced artworks, the effort is made for community members to participate and believe that they themselves can create artistic work.
Raising social issues
Ahmad Nadalian asked people who lived in the local community with low economic capacity to tell and paint their life stories and social issues. The widespread reflection of these drawins, painting and murals in Nadalian’s books and websites led many artists and researchers to become familiar with these existing issues and go to Hormoz for photography, documentary making, cinema films, and sociological research, specifically consulting these individuals. This process helps the people of that community become more demanding and in the long term leads to economic and cultural development. Nadalian paid attention to issues that women suffered from in Qeshm villages. This two-way dialugue between community and artist is constructive and creates more effective and creative art.
One of my talented students in Direstan village was Mrs. Fahimeh.
Joint painting by Ahmad Nadalian and one of the women from Qeshm villages
Art’s contribution to economic empowerment of communities
Another goal was for the people of that community to have economic empowerment. Nadalian would purchase their designs. Over time, some of his pupils developed the ability to independently create drawings, paintings, or wall paintings. They would sell their drawings and canvas paintings to artists and enthusiasts and earn income.
Kaniz
His first student on Hormoz Island was Kaniz. Kaniz had not painted before meeting Nadalian. In the initial steps, her sketches were childlike and later primitive. Nadalian tried to preserve the primitive form of Kaniz’s works. In the early stages, Nadalian use the sketches and paint them with many modifications. That is, he would determine the colors himself.
Nadalian helped Kaniz paint her life on the wall of her house. The work process was such that he would ask Kaniz to draw her family members on paper. While remaining faithful to the overall sketches, Nadalian would draw Kaniz’s sketches on the wall with minor changes in the initial stages and determine their composition.
Stages of executing wall painting work in Kaniz’s house
Social Sculpture or Community-based art by Ahmad Nadalian: brings abandoned environments to life
During the work execution process, Kaniz’s daughters and neighbors would participate. I often determined the colors, background spaces, and patterns and asked Kaniz’s daughters and neighboring women to complete them. I painted some parts and Kaniz also painted some parts directly.
Over time, Kaniz tried to paint rationally and correctly, but I was seeking to achieve art that was primitive, imaginative, strange, and appealing to art and intellectual spaces. Attention to pure primitive works reduces the distance between a marginalized community and intellectual space. This type of primitiveness comes from within and cannot be taught.
But in my absence, people would encourage Kaniz to paint more realistically. Over time, Kaniz learned to paint by herself. In one period, her newer sketches were very simple and decorative. In recent works, faces are closer to reality compared to earlier works.
Khadijeh Pour Abdollahi
Another Hormuzi lady I met and found talented in drawing was Khadijeh Pour Abdollahi. She was born in Hormuz and was the wife of Haj Ali Hormozi and currently lives in Tiab Minab. Unlike Kaniz who had a difficult life, Khadijeh lives in stable conditions.
Khadijeh’s works have a childlike and poetic flavor.
The above samples were designed and I did the coloring.
I painted several of Khadijeh’s works on canvas.
Mohsen
I met Mohsen in 2009. Due to his need, he would come to the to the museum and work. Gradually I encouraged him to draw. Based on his sketches, I created a series of paintings. These collaborative works showed social issues, especially addiction, and continued until the end of his life.
Mohsen’s drawings of an artist on the margins of Hormoz Island
Mohsen’s sketch with the theme of the house of death. It was an image of a house I had purchased. It had previously been a hangout for addicted individuals. I painted his design.
Mosayeb Darya-peyma Hormozi
Mosayeb Darya-peyma Hormozi was another of my students. He was Hassan Darya-peyma’s uncle. Sometimes he lived in Hassan’s mother’s house and sometimes he would provide shelter for himself in ruined environments. In the most difficult conditions, I would give him drawing paper and materials to work with.
Mosayeb Darya-peyma’s drawings. In the top right sketch, he has drawn an addict. There is an ampoule on the addict’s testicle. Other sketches show carrying smuggled goods with boats and conflicts with coast guard forces.
The childlike method in Mosayeb Darya-peyma’s drawings shows that in his works, outside and inside have no meaning. Space continues. Due to this characteristic, I commissioned him to draw the inside of the human body. He said he had worked in healthcare for a while and knew the inside of humans well.
Using inspiration from Mosayeb Darya-peyma’s works, I created several paintings.
Ganji Nasaji
Ganji Nasaji is another person that I worked with for many years. He used to make boat with date palm branches, and he used to make lanterns with wood and tin cans.
During the years when her daughters Fatima (Goli), Zohra and her daughters-in-law were my students, I saw some examples of simple drawings in Fatima Nasaji’s notbook. From then on, I started to give him paper to make drawing. I buy his works. I tried to encourage him to paint imaginary creatures. Sometimes I would create a colored background, provide him with paint and brushs. Finally I finish the work myself.
Last year, the contrasting space of meeting tradition and modernity on Hormoz Island was one of the subjects I liked to paint. But it was better to determine the work methodology through the filter of his imagination.
In recent years, the island is full of backpackers who perform with hang drums and other musical instruments in the natural environment. What they have in common with the island’s people is that they also talk about hidden energies in nature and apparently believe in it.
Good or bad, they are everywhere, and in the mirror of virtual space and real environment, one can see their way of life.
Usually, whenever I am away from my students, instead of imaginative space, a type of sketches that intellectuals consider sloganeering and commonplace appears in the works. Therefore, I believe that self-taught or marginalized artists always need guidance in subject selection and work methods for intellectual appeal. It’s not without reason that all self-taught artists in Iran either have close artist relatives or benefit from intellectual spaces.
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