One of the first followers of Iranian modern art, Javad Hamidi was the teacher of many distinguished Iranian modern artists. Here he is combining landscape painting and principles of modern painting to create a modern work inspired by achievements in landscape painting. It represents the pastoral style prevailing in the literature and Romantic painting of the 19th century. Indeed, depiction of daily life of the underprivileged, as in this work, is the achievement of an array of Iranian artists, beginning with Behzad during the Safavid period.
Similar to other modern artists, Hamidi was concerned about the choice of color, mix of colors on canvas, and composition of painting. Composition and graphic balance in the work that we see indicates the artist’s academic approach to art. Here the focal point is exactly where a woman is dragging along her playful pet. A broad spectrum of inelaborate colors are combined in the picture. Thus a wide range of tones of green, purple, and blue is seen in the work. This way, Hamidi diverged from traditional landscape painters before him. Diversity of works of Javad Hamidi makes it difficult to ascribe him to a certain structural form, though.
Hamidi’s analytical mind was evolved at a time when early modern artists, on the one hand, and remaining followers of the Kamal-ol-Molk School, on the other, were studying at the Faculty of Fine Arts. Spaces in the work clearly demonstrate the polarized atmosphere of art at the time. Hamidi along with Hossein Kazemi and Jalil Ziapoor learned Iranian landscape painting from Ali Mohammad Heydarian – a distinct follower of Kamal-ol-Molk and teacher of the School of Fine Arts – and, as the first students of Faculty of Fine Arts, received a Bachelor of Arts in Painting, 1945. Hamidi’s knowledge of drawing and color throughout his studies soon drew attention of professors of the faculty. So he was hired by the University of Tehran at the recommendation of Heydarian once he graduated. He received a grant and went to Ecole de Beaux Art after a year, attending classes of a distinguished artist such as Andre Loute. Hamidi, Ziapoor, Kazemi, Javadipoor, Pezeshknia, and Vaziri-Moghadam are among the first graduates of European schools who introduced modern western interpretations into Iranian art. Javad Hamidi was awarded the first prize of Tehran Biennial in 1966.
