Saturday, October 13
7:00 p.m.
Presented by the Persian Cultural Center, an annual fundraising event for the benefit of Arts of Iran at The San Diego Museum of Art.
Mohsen Namjoo will perform along with his full band including drums, bass, and guitar.
VIP tickets include a meet & greet session with the artist and access to Arts of Iran and the exhibitions on the Museum’s first floor at 6:00 p.m. in the Museum’s Rotunda.
Persian Cultural Center (PCC) & SDMA members, please use discount code NAMJOO5 for general and premium admissions.
Arts of Iran
Under the leadership of Executive Director Roxana Velásquez and Anita Feldman, Deputy Director for Curatorial Affairs and Education, a 700-square-foot gallery space was newly designated for the Arts of Iran in 2017. Showcasing some of the best Persian art objects from the Museum’s permanent collection as well as twenty fine loan objects of the pre-Islamic time, ranging from the Near Eastern (ca. 2500 BC) to the Sasanian era (224–651 AD) from the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, this gallery illustrates a brief and yet profound development of Persian civilization and art in history and within today’s global context.
History of Persian Art collection and its gallery
The Museum’s collection of Persian art, dating from the ninth to the twentieth centuries, consists of close to two hundred items, including a manuscript of Shahnama (the Epic of Iranian Kings) that was commissioned in India. The Persian art collection was built from around the 1950s to 1960s mainly through gifts as well as Museum purchases with funding from individuals and The Asiatic Arts Committees of the Fine Arts Society, today’s Asian Arts Council (1959.3.a & 1958.33). Mrs. Irving T. Snyder (Caroline Stambaugh, 1891–1974), one of the earliest and the most important donors of Persian art, gifted at least fifty-three Asian art objects to the Museum, including “Sweetmeat dish” (1964.131) and fritwares of the thirteenth century. Both Drs. Edwin Binney 3rd and Catherine Benkaim also gifted some Iranian objects (1971.72) in later decades. The establishment of a new gallery in 2017 provided a dedicated space to honor the Arts of Iran in San Diego, a result of the collaborative efforts between the Museum’s leadership, Dr. Marika Sardar, the former Curator of South Asian and Islamic Art, and the Persian Cultural Center and its community. The Museum is pleased to continue the collaboration with the Persian Cultural Center this year.
This event is sponsored by the Persian Cultural Center.
