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Exhibition

Flower Power

Total Arts at the Courtyard is pleased to present FLOWER POWER/ A NEW DAY 22 March 30 April 2020 Almost every culture, past and present, has some sort of ritual to celebrate the promise of spring and new beginnings. In the visual vocabulary, blooming blossom sand flowering buds often signifies the end to dark winters and the beginning of new and fresh and days to come. Using flowers as subject or material has been a common place for artists and creatives for centuries. When you take a flower in your hand and really look at it, its your world for the moment, Georgia OKeeffe. I paint flowers so they will not die Frida Khalo The hippy flower children in the 1960s and 70s protested and demonstrated their power softly and passively in the manner of their hero Ghandi (the Babaji of Indianindependence). This exhibition is also about the sort of resistance and power and at the same time about the Sufi power of love. Love being the subtext of all life and understanding. The exhibition coincides with the celebration of the new year NOW ROUZ, a none religious celebration. Shaqayeq Arabi and Fereydoun Ave The exhibition features an array of works, embodying both the stylistic elements and socio-political spirit, including artworks by Andy Warhol, CY Towmbly, Alessandro Twombly, Jean-Claude Carrier, Mikhalis Makroulakis, Fereydoun Ave, Shaqayeq Arabi, Reza Derakhshani, Parvaneh Etemadi, Ali Golestaneh, Rana Javadi, ShahlaHosseni- Barzi, Houda Khalladi , Mohseni Kermanshahi, Leyly Matin- Daftari, MalekehNayiny, Mansour Rafie, Abolghasem Saeedi , Vahid Sharifian, and Fereshteh Setayesh. The exhibition also includes a soundscape by Bijan Hazrat and Screening of "Taking off, a film by Milos Forman and Jean-Claude Carrire FLOWER POWER by JEAN-CLAUDE CARRIERE In the course of two or three years, the flower believed it had seized power in the United States of America. It claimed that it was above arms and violence and was going to reign over the world. In March 1968, I joined Milos Forman in New York. His wish was to make a film on this new youth movement called Hippy and the new era that lay ahead. We set ourselves up at the Chelsea Hotel, the undisputed center of the counter culture. The contraceptive pill had been openly sold for a year and 1967 had already experienced a summer love. The entire youth, united against the Vietnam war, seemed to be under the influence of flower power. Flowers were everywhere, over faces, on girls dresses and in the prairies of Central Park, where, On a Sunday, we found ourselves amongst crowds singing and dreaming under a light of marijuana. Peace and love was their motto. Some went to work on roller skates, girls got naked to have their bodies painted over in any fashion. This was called Body painting. On streets, strangers jumped in your face to give you a kiss. Most of them dreamed of new artistic forms that they named psychedelic, a word whose meaning has always escaped me. Born in San Francisco, the movement reached Chicago and New York. St. Marks Place, in the East Village was its center; today, a street like any other. Following diverse incidents, all rather tragic, returning to Europe, the invasion of Czechoslovakia by the Warsaw Pact Troops in August Milos, In September, decided to return to New York. He was supported by Claude Berri who had named Jean- Pierre Rassam as executive producer. I accompanied Milos on the trip. We settled in the East Village and immersed ourselves in the flower world. We hung out with those whom the conservatives (square people) called freaks. We received them at our place, knowing the likes of Janis Joplin who would even come to visit and talk using a slang which took us some time to comprehend since flowers dont talk like us. In fact certain scenes from the film which got to be titled Taking Off had to be given subtitles later in London. A strange hope was there, right under our eyes. Would it lift and transform the planet? Very rapidly, all was abandoned. The war in Vietnam continued. Janis Joplin and other stars died victims of drug overdoses. Flowers withered, old habits rapidly returned. Taking Off was the only film based on this ephemeral power, on this insane hope which was rapidly dashed. It was made on spot in 1970 and with quiet a modest budget. Today, it remains the only filmed testimony of the passage of a flowery dream among young Americans whom I had the chance to get to know and love. Nowadays, when adult Americans watch the film (something quite rare), it makes them laugh a lot. They laugh at their youthful days. Thats at least something. JEAN-CLAUDE CARRIERE