Silent and moving images from Abbas Kiarostami
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One scene from Abbas Kiarostami′s minimalist film "Five", made in 2003, shows a piece of wood on the beach, worn away by salt water, gradually breaking into two pieces -
Kiarostami most recently made a name for himself with the film "Certified Copy" starring Juliette Binoche. In Iran, the film has been banned from being shown in cinemas. But Kiarostami′s films contain no criticism of the regime. All the same, he preferred to shoot them abroad. "Five" is an episodic film in which although little happens, a lot of room is left for interpretation -
Kiarostami was well known for his minimalistic style. The Iranian held the view that life cannot be planned; it depends on a lot of coincidences. The film "Five" expresses this uncertainty, with the repeated appearance of the moon covered by clouds. The interplay of concealing and revealing is characteristic of Kiarostami -
Kiarostami called this series of images "Rain and Wind" – he took the photos through the windscreen of a car. The photo is reminiscent of a painting. The drops of water swept across the windscreen look as if they have been painted with a brush. Once again, we see Kiarostami′s imagery at work, always probing behind the overly obvious -
Kiarostami studied painting for 13 years. Then he realised that working with a camera appealed to him more. The motif of rain appears frequently in his photographs. The rain makes it difficult to see the world outside. The viewer can vaguely make out some trees, but the rest is left to the imagination -
The last two pictures come from the "Snow White" series, created between 1978 and 2004. Tree-trunks and their shadows appear in a snow-covered landscape. Here, too, Kiarostami plays with the relationship between image and reflection -
Trees stand in a deserted landscape. They have a human quality about them, look almost lost. Kiarostami usually depicted Iranian subjects in his images: the expanse and emptiness of the landscape. The Iranian, whose photographs can already be seen in international museums, made no distinction between film and art. Many of his films resemble photographs and vice versa