Iran to mount poster expo on Nelson Mandela

Tehran, Dec 3, IRNA – The Iranian Artists Forum (IAF) will hold an international poster exhibition titled “Nelson Mandela: The Bird of Freedom” which will present 76 posters. Following the exhibition’s call last year, made concurrent with the death of the South African hero Nelson Mandela, a total of 422 posters by 342 graphic designers were received. Designers from 22 countries submitted their works to the event’s secretariat, according to a report from the PR department of IAF on Wednesday. The countries include: Iran, Spain, Germany, Argentina, Ecuador, Italy, the U.K., the U.S., Bolivia, Peru, Turkey, Denmark, Japan, Switzerland, France, Canada, South Korea, Hungary, Macedonia, Venezuela and the Netherlands. Out of the submitted works, 76 posters by 63 artists were chosen by the jury chaired by Sabina Oberholzer and Renato Tagli from Switzerland and Scott Laserow from the United Sates. Works of Arber Kolonja from Macedonia, Behnam Raeesian, Elahe Abiat, Emran Abdollahi, Farnaz Damnabi and Reyhane Alaei from Iran, Jerome Rebiere from France and Marlena Buczek Smith from the United States were selected as top eight works of which three best ones will be chosen and awarded on the opening day. The expo, which will be attended by foreign ambassadors and a group of artists, will open on the first death anniversary of Nelson Mandela, December 5. It will run until Dec. 12 in the ‘Spring’ and ‘Summer’ halls of IAF located on Mousavi St., Taleghani Ave, Tehran, Iran. Mandela served as president of South Africa from 1994 to 1999, and was the first South African president to be elected in a fully representative democratic election. After years of resistance against apartheid rule in South Africa, Mandela was arrested in 1962. He was sentenced to life in prison, where he served over 27 years. He spent many of those years on Robben Island. In South Africa, Mandela is often known as Madiba, his clan name, or as tata, which means father./end