Pooyan Tabatabaei

Pooyan Tabatabaei was born on July 7, 1979 in Tehran (Iran). In 2000, right after achieving B.Sc. of Industrial Management he chose Canada as a second home. With more than a decade of experience in photojournalism in Canada, university background in Art and management,  Pooyan Tabatabaei has contributed to push the boundaries in Canadian visual art by achieving international prestige’s awards and receiving many nominations. While his photojournalistic images has been published in numerous international magazines and dailies, He’s artistic visionary   has been appreciated by the art society and he has chosen to be a curator for the international festivals and exhibitions.  Since 1998 he has documented the lives of many incredible and unique people of different cultures, religions, beliefs and value systems. In reflecting the true image of the subjects, his photographs aim to capture the essence of the person in a way that he hopes will impact the lives of the people who see his photographs as much as the subjects impacted him.

Alongside of numerous exhibitions which presented his artistic works, he’s photojournalistic images flourished the media industry such as NVP(Canada), CBC(Canada), Time Magazine (USA), Polaris(USA) Spigel(Germany), BBC(UK), Photomasi(Italy), Panorama (Italy) and….

has also covered regional conflicts like India Crisis ,the Egypt Uprising, and Libya Crisis in 2011.

Pooyan Tabatabaei

 There is an abiding philosophical question – who are we and why are we here? The answer lies, in part, before the question is even asked, in the undeniable presence of existence.

Pooyan Tabatabaei’s recent series becomes a viable visual answer to the question. The set-up is simple. A figure, we assume it is a woman, in a chador, interacts with a snowy landscape and from that interaction an integration happens. There is equality between the two. The landscape embraces the cloaked figure.

The woman is camouflaged by the billowing second skin. She has an undeniable place in the organic order, even more so than if her identity was clearer for in Tabatabaei’s visual interpretation, there is no conflict between the human and the landscape, no assertion on the part of the dominant species to rule, but rather a melding into each other.

The sensation of equable exchange can be broken down within a compositional analysis. When the chador is spotted and closer to the snowy whites of the background, it forms a mute liaison with the footprints, or the patterns of snow on the branches. The figure breaks the static vertical insistence of the trunks of the trees as they have, in turn, broken the continuity of the perfect whiteness.

The spotted covering lends itself to the shape of the body or accepts the influence of the wind. The black chador and the white snow are also is engaged in a visual conversation. The stubborn insistence of the dark shape, often abstracting the figure or making it into an anthropomorphic characterisation of another species, also has an irreversible part to play in the unfolding of things.

The woman in the chador takes up space as a negative shape between positives or as a figure enveloped by the ground rather than sitting upon the background. The metaphor is grand and well spoken. Between the black and the white, the symbolic positive and negative, the plus and minus, there is a divine balance. The balance is beauty. The equation is perfect and Tabatabaei has stopped the blur of time and recorded the symmetry, between man (or woman) and the earth, between the figure and the ground, between the asking of the question and the receiving of the answer.

Julie Oakes

Selected Exhibitions

2012    Juried Exhibition – Imam Ali Museum of art. (Iran)

2012    Juried Exhibition – International Fadjr Festival . (Iran)

2011    Image of the Year Festival (Iran)

2010    Juried Exhibition – Association of photographers of Iran . (Iran)

2009    Group Exhibition – Trilogy – Mekic Gallery – Montreal, (Canada)

2008    Juried Exhibition – Inner Eye –  Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art (Iran)

2007    Solo Exhibition – Journey through My Imagination- Headbones Gallery – Toronto, (Canada)

 2007   Juried Exhibition – The art of Photography show- LYCEUM Theater Gallery – San Diego , (U.S.A)

2007    Group Exhibition – Humanitarian Photography Award Exhibition – London, (England)
2007    The art of photography show – San Diego, (USA)
2007    Captured Moments – Arta Gallery, Toronto , (Canada)
2007    Group Exhibition– Edinburgh, (Scotland)
2007    The 10th Luis Valtueña International Humanitarian Photography Award Exhibition – Madrid , (Spain)
2005    6th Annual Children photography (Iran)
2005    Tasvir-e-Sal Photo and graphic festival, Iran
2004    9th Tehran photo biennial- Museum of contemporary art( Iran)

 

Selected Achievements

2012   Honorable Mention Award from Image of the year festival

2012   Award Winner for International Fadjr Festival (Iran) 

2011    Scholarship award from Magnum Foundation. (USA)

2011    Journalist award from “National Ethnic press and Media Council of Canada”

2007   Honerable Mention Award from The Art of photography show (USA)
2007  Award Nominated for the 10th Luis Valtueña International Humanitarian Photography (Spain)

2006    Award Nominated for WACC photographic competition (USA)
2005    Award Nominated for 6th Children photography Contest (Iran)
2003    Silver award from the International society of photographers for the image titled ‘Flight to Eternity’ (USA)

2003    Bronze Medallion for the collection Called “Canadian Maritimes” the International society  of photographers (USA)