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The Oriental Michael Angelo

Fereydoun Sadighi is the oldest son of Abolhassan Khan Sadighi the prominent Iranian painter and sculptor Master. He did the same as his father and entered the wonderland of art and sculpture. He has been graduated from the Academy of Art in Vienna, Austria. Here, you can read our interview with Fereydoun Sadighi about his father Abolhassan Sadighi.

7sang Interview team
Translated by: Nina Jamshid Nejad

Fereydoun Sadighi is the oldest son of Abolhassan Khan Sadighi the prominent Iranian painter and sculptor Master. He did the same as his father and entered the wonderland of art and sculpture. He has been graduated from the Academy of Art in Vienna, Austria. Here, you can read our interview with Fereydoun Sadighi about his father Abolhassan Sadighi.

+ You can read Abolhassan Sadighi’s biography here.
+ You can see pictures of some of Abolhassan Sadighi’s works here.

_How was your relationship with your father? Please tell us a little bit about him.

-We always talked about art. He used to tell me not to pay attention to the secondary points. Just to listen to the sound my hammer would make and not to even notice if somebody would call my name. He told me not to let anyone make me feel revengeful. And if it happened, there would always be a piece of stone I could hit till it goes smooth! He was really a strange man. I would have just told you I loved him as my father, if you had asked me twenty years ago. But now I can’t ignore I mostly honor him as a real artist. Cause the man he was while working, can’t be found anywhere else. In the hot summers when no one else would ever bother himself working, he worked from morning till night. Not easy at all if you have to hit a large stone with a hammer with the weight of 2 kilograms! And at the end of the day, when you would saw a real masterpiece, you’d just wonder how that ugly, hard stone has became to such a marvelous thing.

-What can you tell us about your father as a sculptor?

-As I am a sculptor myself and have enough experience in this field, I can tell you for sure that it is really unfair even if you say my father was the number one sculptor in Iran. My father is the one. The only one. This is the reason why I think it’s unfair to compare him with other sculptors. There is no one like him in the whole country. I used to work with an Austrian artist called professor Ambrosi. He was one of the greatest sculptors in the whole Europe. After seeing my father’s works, professor Ambrosi said in an interview that my father was the Michael Angelo of the orient. He said it was the time for Europeans to stop being proud of their Michael Angelo. There was another one in the orient also!

-Which of your father’s sculptures is the most famous one? And which one your father, himself liked the most?

-There were three poets my father really loved: Khayyam, Ferdowsi and saadi. He even used their poets when talking. The Italians like my father’s sculpture of Kayyam as much as they like Michael Angelo’s David. The very sculpture that is located in the Laleh Park now. When this sculpture was still in his working place in Italy, people would come to see it, take pictures, etc. the Italian papers had written about it also. In Italy, my father is as famous as he is here in Iran. This sculpture was also the one he, himself liked the most.

-Something memorable about your father?

-One day, when I was about fifteen I went to my father’s workplace. Having seen he was not there, I took his hammer and started hitting the stone he was working on. I have never done that before. I didn’t exactly know what I was doing. I just enjoyed hitting the stone. Suddenly, I felt someone was pulling me back by my ear! Having slapped me on face, my father asked me what the hell I was doing there. I tolled him I was trying to make a sculpture. He said to me angrily that I was better not to do so, ever. He said “Look at me! Can’t you see how troubling your sculptor father’s life is? Wanna have more troubles than me? You want a hard life like mine? Ok, go on sculpturing…!”. “ Now, …” He shouted ”Get out of here!” I still remind of that day whenever I work on the stones.

Abolhassan Sadighi’s works

Landscape Drawing from Venice, Florence, Rome, Paris, Marseille; Portrait of Abu Ali Sina, Sa'di, Hafez, Imam Ali, Ferdosi.Landscape Drawing from Venice, Florence, Rome, Paris, Marseille; Portrait of Abu Ali Sina, Sa'di, Hafez, Imam Ali, Ferdosi.Landscape Drawing from Venice, Florence, Rome, Paris, Marseille; Portrait of Abu Ali Sina, Sa'di, Hafez, Imam Ali, Ferdosi.

 

Abolhassan Khan Sadighi Watercolours

 

Abolhassan Khan Sadighi Drawing

 

Abolhassan Khan Sadighi oil

Abolhassan Khan Sadighi sculpture

Biography of Abolhassan Sadighi

The prominent Iranian painter and sculptor Master Abolhassan Khan Sadighi was born in the Odlaydjan area of Tehran in 1897. At the age of seven he went to the Aghdassieh school which was established by Sa'id al-Olamai Laridjani, one of the founders of the modern schools in Iran. Influenced by his family's encouragement, he entered the Alliance school after finishing his primary education.

Source:
Abolhassan Khan Sadighi
Publication Centre of the Iranian National Commission for UNESCO-IRAN
Originally written by Hadi Seyf,
Translated/revised by JAS: Jonathan "Hass" ABOLHASSAN Sadighi


The prominent Iranian painter and sculptor Master Abolhassan Khan Sadighi was born in the Odlaydjan area of Tehran in 1897. At the age of seven he went to the Aghdassieh school which was established by Sa'id al-Olamai Laridjani, one of the founders of the modern schools in Iran. Influenced by his family's encouragement, he entered the Alliance school after finishing his primary education. There, while learning various subjects, he instinctly was attracted to painting and drawing without any teacher or guidance. Though still unskilled and without experience, his first paintings and drawings awed the school officials, his parents, and his relatives.

His love for painting and drawing was so strong that, in the last year of his education at the Alliance school, he went away to Master-al-Molk Ghaffari and attended his class in the School of Delicate Crafts. Due to his untiring efforts in founding the mystery of creation and benefiting from the guidance and teachings of the most unique painter of the time, he became one of the most remarkable art students of the school. During his next three years in that school, he succeeded in getting a high degree diploma in painting. It was at the end of this educational time in the School of Delicate Crafts that Master Kamal-al-Molk, seeing his talent and efficiency, appointed him as a teacher of painting and drawing to that school.

Shortly after becoming a teacher, he started to find himself with a secret attraction towards sculplture. Without adequate means, he ventured to create his first stucco bust of a child and offered it to his great Master, Kamal-al-Molk. At that time, sculpture was unknown and without precedent not only in the School of Delicate Crafts, but in all of Iran. Therefore, Master Abolhassan Khan Sadighi's innovative first sculpture was the beginning of a new movement in the field in Iran.

After numerous experiences in creating plaster sculptures, he made his first stone sculpture on a stucco model of Venus de Milo. The sculpture received so much credit and praise that Kamal-al-Molk took his apprentice and the Venus sculpture to the Court, and introduced him to Ahmad Shah of the Qajar dynasty. Then, after that meeting, he was offered a monthly salary from the order of Ahmad Shah and then became the director of the School of Delicate Crafts. Upon this honor, he totally devoted himself to sculpture and made sculptures from both plaster and stone. These sculptures, such as the bust Ferdowssi on the Eagle's Wings, the full statue of Amir Kabir, and the most memorable of all, Kaka the Black Flute Player, remained the most glorious artistic achievements of the School of Delicate Crafts. Kaka the Black Flute Player would also be forever highly appraised by art experts around the World.

Sadly, 1928 was the year of the exile of Kamal-al-Molk to Hosseinabad of Nishabour and the dispertion of intimate pupils and friends of the school. It was so hard for Master Abolhassan to endure that, with a tiny amount of money that he had saved throughout the years, he went to Europe. In Europe he visited many countries, and for four years he studied sculpture at Ecole des Beaux-Arts in France. His teacher was Ange Albert, the skillful master of sculpture in Beaux-Arts.

Surprisingly, in Beaux-Arts he managed to prove himself more talented in competition with other art students of that Ecole. During his stay in Europe, he created, in addition to sculptures, some works in oil and water-colour which showed the influenced he got from the new European art movements of the time.

In 1932, after returning to Iran, he accepted a request, in obedience, from his exiled Master Kamal-al-Molk to re-open the School of Delicate Crafts and be its director. Once again, the school became a center for the talented art students, many of whom were to play important roles in the development of sculpture in Iran.

The School of Delicate Crafts lasted almost to the death of Master Kamal-al-Molk, and then was closed forever for unknown reasons. However, sometime later another art school was established, called the School of Fine Arts. It was associated with the Ministry of Culture. After spending many years in seclusion and starting a family, Master Abolhassan Khan Sadighi did not accept the initial invitation for teaching at the new school. After a lot of persistence by those involved in the school and responsible for art, he inevitably accepted to teach sculpture in the School of Fine Arts.

A few years after the school was established, it joined as a part of Tehran University. It then became known as the Faculty of Fine Arts and had various art branches, including a department for sculpture under the supervision of Master Abolhassan Khan Sadighi. In those active years, he taught and trained many talented young people, many of whom became sculptors later on. After spending years of hard work on teaching, training, and creating, he retired from Tehran University in 1967.

In addition to teaching sculpture to numerous art students and creating many artistically valuable oil and water-colour paintings, Master Abolhassan Khan Sadighi showed his artistic genius by making the huge and monumental stone statue of The Angel of Justice, which was 2.70 meters high and which was commissioned by the Ministry of Justice. This statue is undoubtedly one of the masterpieces of sculpture not only in Iran, but thoughout the entire World.

In 1950, Master Abolhassan Khan Sadighi accepted a membership into the National Art Works Society and entered the most creative period of his life. He mad many lasting statues of celebrated men of literature and science of Iran such as Sheikh Sa'di of Shiraz, Ferdowsi of Tus, the great philosopher and physician Abu-Ali Sina (Avicenna), and the bronze statue of Nadir Shah Accompanied by His Horseman, which was cast in Milan, Italy. The most important of his works during that period was the monumental and magnificent Statue of Ferdowsi, which was set up in Villa Borghes Square of Rome and made the sculptor well known to European art societies.

The career of Master Abolhassan Khan Sadighi as a sculptor ended, in fact, by making busts and statues of the Iranian poet and philosopher Khayyam. He then isolated himself from the art world almost entirely, and spent time raising his family, including my Father, Farhad.

Alas, this unique old Master and forerunner of plastic arts in Iran has never said much about his past or revealed many mysteries hidden beneath his genuine creations. Had he spoken of himself or about his long life, the story of nearly one hundred years of painting and sculpture in Iran would have been more revealed to the public. When he did speak, he would only describe his paintings as some dust on paper and canvas and his sculptures as a waste heap of stone and plaster. Now it is indeed up to the future generations to evaluate Master Abolhassan Khan Sadighi's achievements and his contributions to the development of painting and sculpture in Iran and the rest of the World.

Abolhassan Khan Sadighi's oil

A Laundry in Paris / A Village Near Florence / Copy of Raphael's Madonna and Jesus / Landscape of Damavand Village / Portrait of a Housemaid (Naneh Hossin) / Portrait of Saint Mary, the Artist, and his Friend Master Heydaryan (Diploma Project for Kamal-al-Molk School) / Portrait of the Master's Wife (Unfinished) / Self-Portrait of the Master as a Young Man in Venice / The Icon of Imam Ali / The Master's House in Monti Parioli, Rome

A Laundry in Paris

A Village Near Florence

Copy of Raphael's Madonna and Jesus

Landscape of Damavand Village

Portrait of a Housemaid (Naneh Hossin)

Portrait of Saint Mary, the Artist, and his Friend Master Heydaryan (Diploma Project for Kamal-al-Molk School)

Portrait of the Master's Wife (Unfinished)

Self-Portrait of the Master as a Young Man in Venice

The Icon of Imam Ali

The Master's House in Monti Parioli, Rome

Abolhassan Khan Sadighi's Watercolours

A Quay in Venice / Landscape Near Marseille / Landscape of a Southern Part of France / Landscape of an Old Quarter in Paris / Landscape of Paris Suburbs / Landscape of Venice / San Marco Square in Venice / The Cathedral of Venice / View of the Grand Channel in Venice / View of the River Seine

A Quay in Venice

Landscape Near Marseille

Landscape of a Southern Part of France

Landscape of an Old Quarter in Paris

Landscape of Paris Suburbs

Landscape of Venice

San Marco Square in Venice

The Cathedral of Venice

View of the Grand Channel in Venice

View of the River Seine

Abolhassan Khan Sadighi's sculptures

Abolhassan Khan Sadighi's Drawings

Harbour of Gondolas in Venice / Landscape of Florence / Pier of Gondolas in Venice / Portrait of a Young Woman in Rome / Portrait of Abu Ali Sina / Portrait of Hafez, the Great Lyricist / Portrait of Sa'di / Profile of Abu Ali Sina / Self-Portrait of the Master as a Young Man in Florence / Self-Portrait of the Master as a Young Man in Paris

Harbour of Gondolas in Venice

Landscape of Florence

Pier of Gondolas in Venice

Portrait of a Young Woman in Rome

Portrait of Abu Ali Sina

Portrait of Hafez, the Great Lyricist

Portrait of Sa'di

Profile of Abu Ali Sina

Self-Portrait of the Master as a Young Man in Florence

Self-Portrait of the Master as a Young Man in Paris