New: a Beate Petersen & Nasseredin Mirza Video

A slice of the history of Persia in the second half of the 18th century in a beautiful and greatly
informative Beate Petersen's video - a clever montage of animation and Nasser al-Din's
daguerrotypes, depicting the life and some deadly intrigues at the court of the Shah, where
women have had a huge influence. His mother and two favorites among his 84 women, in
particular, have determined the major political turning points of that time.

"In 1842, a Persian delegation visited Queen Victoria,
in England. When they returned home, they brought
with them a Daguerrotype photographic camera, a gift
from the queen to the 11 year-old heir to the Persian
throne, Nasseredin Mirza. The young heir fell in love
with the magical contraption.
In the following decades, he documented his life,
revealing to the public eye what the public eye was
never supposed to see..."


ناصرالدین شاه و 84 زن او is the result of a brilliant combination:
the photographic documentation of Nasser al-Din through
Beate Petersen's magic looking glass... with the added charm
of Milad Movahedi's soundtrack.



Beate Petersen © 2011 - "Nasser al-Din Shah & His 84 Wives"


A few women of the Shah's harem - from private life straight to posterity.

From the 'shah's illness and the calico cat' episode - I couldn't resist to such a cat story.

"After Nasseredin Shah's death, the older and respected women remained in the harem.
The others were sent back to their relatives with yearly pensions or they moved to the holy
cities of Karbala and Najaf. Anis o-Dolch survived her husband by only a few months."

REFERENCES:
- The Diary of H.M. the Shah of Persia.
- Abbas Amanat, 'Pivot of the Universe, Nasir al-Din Shah and the Iranian Monarchy, 1831-1896'.
- Taj al-Saltanah, 'Crowning Anguish, Memoirs of a Persian Princess'.
Afsaneh Najmabadi, 'Women with mustaches and Men without beards'.
- Nikki R. Keddif, 'Qajar, Iran and the Rise of Reza Khan'.
- Lois Beck, editor, 'Women in Iran from 1800 to the Islamic Republic'.

Thanks to TehranBureau/FrontLine for pointing out
this video as well as for suggesting further reading
through the entries of the Encyclopædia Iranica:
- Harem: "Women played an important role in the life
of the Qajar monarchs. Fatḥ-'Ali Shah and Nāṣer-al-Din
Shah, in particular, kept a large harem", etc.

- Nasser al-Din Shah is also depicted in the movie Nassereddin Shah, Actor-e Cinema (Once
Upon a Time, Cinema) 1992, written and directed by Mohsen Makhmalbaf.
- He is the main character of the short story De koning, 2002, the novel De koning, 2011 and
by the Persian–Dutch writer Kader Abdolah. [Wikipedia].


VIDEO slideshow [Key1Cracker]

- Nāṣer al-Dīn Shāh on Encyclopædia Britannica.
- QAJAR PHOTO ALBUM
- QAJAR, pictory...



Somptuous and unconventional, this 1896 painting of the Shāh by the artist Kamal Al-Molk,
Mohammad Gaffari shows Nasser al-Din lost in a huge Hall of Mirrors [which is also the
painting title]. You can read Houman Harouni's post on TehranBureau.
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And the 100th artist to climb Le Mur is...

Le M.U.R. - # 100 - ROA - june 30/2011


Music: dj Black Sifichi - Fela Kuti "Demo Crazy".

Passed by a first time around 3, then on my way back around 4:30
pm, work was still in progress... Shame on me, but I wanted so badly
a G@tto's foamy coffe that I left and went back home.



[75018laurence]

A few steps away, in the Rue Saint Maur, Ella & Pitr provided a frame
for you to shoot yourself in front of it...

... so smile and shoot your photo memories of Paris/Oberkampf.

And do not forget to send a copy to the artists!
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Bolly Be Good... in Toronto !

Toronto hosted last week, June 24-26, the International Indian Film Academy awards, the
Indian version of the Oscars - a three-day festival of dance, music, fashion and movies
culminating in a massive movie awards gala.

[Reuters]
Numerous cultural events, film workshops, and movie screenings have also taken place
across the GreaterTorontoArea in the past week, leading up to Saturday night's festivities.

[Chris Young]

For a street level view of these events, CBCNews.ca assembled a team of citizen bloggers.
They've been submitting photos of star sightings, sending updates, and writing about what
Indian cinema means to them.

LINKS:
* Bollywood film awards set for Toronto
* The India's gritty independent cinema
* The backstory, the dinasties, the Bollywood effect
* 10 essential movies from India
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"End Harassment" Campaign Goes on line...

By opening a window to freedom and basic rights,
the Arab spring has also highlighted the problem
of sexual harassment that, whether they like it or
not, is a huge obstacle to development in Muslim
countries.

Bikya Masr, a site showing a real concern about women rights, released today a post
by its editor-in-chief Joseph Mayton on the 'End Harassment' campaign :
"... led by HarassMap – Egypt’s most effective organization that has been tallying incidents of harassment
across the country in an effort to help assist women when they traverse what has become and almost war
zone-like atmosphere. Harassment is everywhere, but the online campaigners say it can end."



STAY TUNED - FOLLOW HarassMap & G@ttoGiallo's NEWS on twitter !
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Second Asian 'Dies Iræ' in Paris' streets

This Sunday, at the initiative of the collective of Asian associations in France,
several thousand people marched in Paris, from the place de la République
to the place de la Nation, to protest against violence and require more security.

Apparently, no concrete solution has been found or desired
since last year when, for the first time, the Chinese community
organized a demonstration to denounce the intolerable
situation which has lasted for fifteen years, asking authorities
to protect people from any aggressive behaviour and violence.
For some reasons, the protest had turned to ethnic clash...
because of subsequent aggression on a Chinese woman.


To understand the basis of this wrath that could jeopardize the art of 'living together' which
has long characterized a multicultural neighborhood of Paris like Belleville, I suggest you to
listen to this France-Culture podcast:
- China from the edge: "Belleville, Chronicle of a Yellow Anger" - an audio documentary
by Alexander Héraud and Nathalie Salles about how and why all this first started on June 2010
and still hurts one year later.
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[Happy listening ... However, if you are familiar with French].