Spirit of Indian art and culture to liven up Iranian Artists Forum next week

TEHRAN,May 29(MNA) -- The halls and galleries of the Iranian Artists Forum (IAF) will be playing host to music performances and art and cultural shows during the Iran-India Cultural Festival, which will open next week. The IAF will organize several music performances, seminars, film screenings and art shows during the festival, which will be held from June 7 to 12. The Indian Ambassador D.P. Srivastava and IAF Director Majid Sarsangi explained the programs of the festival during a press conference at IAF on Monday. “India and Iran are so close together that it is difficult to find any other civilization or culture with such affinities,” Srivastava said. He praised the Persian language as the savior of some classic Indian texts since the books survived through the Persian versions. “Knowing Persian is a sign of culture in India and it was the official language of the country for seven centuries,” he added. Srivastava and Director of Academy of Persian Language and Literature Gholamali Haddad-Adel will attend the opening ceremony of the event, Sarsangi said at the press conference. Panels of experts will discuss Indian cultural and artistic issues including dramatic literature, architecture, photography, Indian contemporary fine arts, media and music during daily seminars. “Bismillah of Benaras”, a documentary by Nasreen Munni about the classical musician Ustad Bismillah Khan and “The Story of Gitanjali”, a documentary by Reba Som about the collection of poems by Rabindranath Tagore, and several other films will be shown during the event. Indian musician Rajesh Prasanna accompanied by several Iranian musicians including Ali Borujerdi, Sadeq Mahdavi, Saeid Tehrani and Hossein Neyestan will give performances at the festival. Works by six Indian artists and a number of Iranian artists will be showcased in exhibits at the IAF’s galleries. The festival will be held under the auspices of the Art and Cultural Organization of the Tehran Municipality.