February 07 2020
The 12th Tehran Auction of Iranian artworks earned 317.17 billion rials ($2.4 million at the rate of 130,000 rials per US dollar), a substantial drop from the last such auction.
The auction January 17 at Tehran’s Persian Azadi Hotel saw 118 classic and modern artworks on sale.
A work by Hossein Zen-deroudi, a painter, calligrapher and sculptor, known as a pioneer of Iranian modern art and one of the earliest artists to incorporate Arabic calligraphy elements into his artwork, was sold for 32 billion rials ($244,000) to fetch the highest price at the January auction, Tehranauction.com reported. That one sale amounted to more than one-tenth of the auction’s total gross.
The next highest prices, amounting to 19 billion rials ($145,000) and 16 billion rials ($122,000), respectively, were paid for works by Manouchehr Yektai and Farhad Moshiri.
The Tehran Auction was launched in 2012 as an endeavor to address the increasing interest in modern and contemporary Iranian art.
The twice-a-year event also aims to support the domestic art market as a key to the international market.
The last Tehran Auction was held July 5, 2019, and grossed 422.04 billion rials ($3.22 million), a third more than this month’s auction.