Mohammad Reza Aslani

He has studied Painting at School of Decorative Arts in Tehran which is now known as University of Art. He is also graduated from Technical School of Television and Cinema which is now Iran Broadcasting University under Mostafa Farzaneh with a graduate diploma in Filmmaking with specialization in Production Design. He has married Dr. Soudabeh Fazaeli novelist and researcher. They have a son Amin who is also a filmmaker and two daughters Gita, who studies Performing Arts and Film Studies at Université Paris Nanterre and Narges who is a graphic designer.[2] In 2015, Aslani received his certificate of First Order Artistic Badge of Ph.D. equivalent from Ministry of Culture and Iranian Academy of the Arts.[3]

Before becoming a renowned as a filmmaker, Aslani got known as a poet. He and his wife, Soudabeh Fazaeli mostly recognize themselves as participants of a particular literary movement called Alternative Poem (She'er-e-Digar) and Alternative Prose (Nathr-e-Digar). Some of the important figures of this movement includes Bijan Elahi, Yadollah Royaee, Bahram Ardabili and Hushang Irani.[4] Although some researcher including Esmaeel NooriAla believes his poetry is an influential one through the New Wave Poetry of Iran.[5] Also as mentioned above he is the writer of the Espacementalism manifesto which for some reasons he ended up not signing the manifesto.

Coming from a visual arts background, in 1962 he and some of his classmates in school of decorative arts such as Mehdi Sahabi, Hossein Rasael, Manouchehr Safarzadeh, Farshid Maleki and Ghodsi Ghazinoor together published a book of poetry named Shabhâye Nimkati, Roozhây-e-Bâd (Bench-y Nights, Wind Days) which went viral through Iranian literary salons at the time and was considered as avant-garde future of the new wave poetry and also graphic design. He mentions that in school of decorative arts, instead of learning any classical form of painting, he directly started to learn modern architecture and art and their worldview towards the environment became his questions as well. His questions beside the questions of the Imagist in England or France was also what he called the plasticity of the image in poetry.[6]

Although his style, sometimes, is pretty similar to some of his contemporaries like Ahmadi or Farrokhzad but being highly under the influence of Kandinsky, as a poet of new wave, he believed that style of the artist forms around the essential needs and emotions of his soul. For the same reason his poetry does not have the musicality of Nima's poetry and also does not have the emotional variation and sentimentalism of the Ahmadi's poems as well. He brought everyday language to poetry, not like any other, and with a painting-like composition. Later he abandoned the New Wave Poetry into the New Wave Cinema. With his second book, Bar Tafâzol-e-Do Maghreb (On Differential of Two Occidents), he disappointed New Wave movement by revising his style and aesthetics and also in his third book, Soognâme-ye-Sâlha-ye-Mamnooe (Requiem of the Abandoned Years), he completely opposed his own style in his first book.[7] As he mentions:

The group called the New Wave formed two years after this book (Shabhâye Nimkati, Roozhây-e-Bâd). In 1964 we were introduced to the title "New Wave". These poems are the product of 1959-61. In Spring 62 the book was published. I didn't think that I am doing something modern. Afterall it is ridiculous that one thinks that s/he is doing something modern. I did what I had to do and that's why the second book is different from the first one. The very statement that says because I've found a new style I should stick to it and I should keep working in it, in a way, is nonsense. The question is what path I am in and where this path leads to. I am not committed to any kind of achievement. These achievements can be added up to. But cannot become fixated. This happening is another kind of dogmatism or traditionalism. I try to find a new thing any moment and staying the same for even a moment is meaningless. The question is that how can I form a dynamic movement in myself. The most important thing is how to be honest with ourselves. Being committed to an extrinsic matter is meaningless. When this collection got published, it is outside of me. Now that they called me "Poet of the New Wave" should I be committed to it? I published this collection as an internal ebullition and also dependent on all elements of modern thinking. This modern thinking is dependent on not a knowledge of painting, but a painterly way of thinking. Painting is not only an art; It is a worldview. Painting turns the world into a visual text. It is a way of thinking. What Kandinsky says that you can make a world with lighting, color tones and contrasts and compositions does not mean that you have to mimic the world. Anyways, it was an issue for us that poetry is not mere sentimentalism.[8]

In 2019, his new historical-epic poem book called Hezâr Bâde-ye Hezâr Bâd dar Hezâreh-hâye Shab-e-Too-bar-Too (Thousand Wines of Thousand Wind in Millenary of Labyrinth-ed Night) got published after 49 years, since the SAVAK had taken it all away. According to an interview he had to rewrite the whole book of 200 pages based on 30 pages of draft he found in his archive. Many historical and mythological characters of Iranian culture like Rostam, Ayn al-Quzat Hamadani, Al-Hallaj, Bidel Dehlavi and Ya'qub ibn al-Layth al-Saffar are among the characters of this epopee. He wrote this book under the influence of Shahname.[9]

National Iranian Radio and Television logo designed by Mohammad Reza Aslani

As student in school of decorative arts, he used to watch artistic films in Cinematheque of Tehran also known as Film Club (Kanoon-e-Film) with two of his friends and classmates Iraj Anvari and Edward Arshamian. After seeing an announcement poster for production designer recruitment course by Ministry of Arts and Culture, although he never wanted to become a filmmaker, by insistence of his friends he decided to take the entrance exam for the course which was on the same day. While being late for the exam, he and Anvari took it and Arshamian gave up. In the end, he got accepted for the filmmaking course which took 9 months.

Later he got into the newly founded National Iranian Radio and Television as an art director and senior production designer. He also designed the logo for the Institution. Later he got introduced to Fereydoun Rahnema who was Television's content and research advisor at the time. After Rahnema proposed a program to Reza Ghotbi, the NIRT's head at the time about making experimental documentaries about different parts of Iran, Aslani alongside Basir Nasibi, Parviz Kimiavi, Hassanali Kowsar, Houshang Azadivar, Naser Taghvai and others started making films. Rahnema himself produced his first film Jaam-e-Hasanlou about the golden bowl of Hasanlu. The film consists of scenes from bowl's motifs while the narrator reads from Passion of Al-Hallaj of the Tazkirat al-Awliyā by Attar of Nishapur while the soundtrack consisted of Rappresentatione di Anima, et di Corpo by Emilio de' Cavalieri.

For various reasons, many of Aslani's movies while being theoretically important remained unnoticed until recent years. In the world of feature films, he made The Chess Game of the Wind in 1976 with the production of Bahman Farmanara. It took him 6 years to finance and finally make the movie. Controversies while screening the movie and after 1979 revolution towards archiving it made it tough for the movie to come out. In 2020, Scorsese Foundation restored the movie for Cannes 2020 to be shown in classics section of the festival.[11] He also made The Green Fire in 2008 after years of not working. The film supposed to be shot in the Bam Citadel but after 2003 Bam earthquake and complete destruction of the citadel, the project got delayed. Later he made the movie in a citadel near Kerman. The movie consists of different narratives in different timelines narrating an old Iranian tale called Sang-e-Sabour.[12] Once again, its complex narrative and sometimes lack of budget made the film unnoticed.

In the book, The Being of the Mirror, he states that he has written two scripts on Mowlana Rumi and also Saadi which he is looking forward to finance them for years but he has not succeeded.

During 1964-74 he and his wife founded a publication called Nashr-e-Noghreh. It introduced different style of book design and publishing for its time. Nashr-e-Noghre got closed after its office caught in fire because they have published Women without Men by Shahrnoush Parsipur.[13]

• Mohammad Reza Aslani at IMDb