[THEATER] MAHMOUD: The One Woman Smash-Hit
Returning to Los Angeles for a 3 week extended 
run, January 10 to 27, 2013, MAHMOUD is a one-woman show about an aging Iranian engineer-cum-taxi driver, a fabulously gay Spaniard, and a young Iranian-Canadian girl, all trying to get by the day-to-day grind in a big metropolitan city. Iranian born playwright/performer TARA GRAMMY invites us to watch as these characters’ stories intertwine over the course of an hour, exploring themes of displacement, immigration, home, and culture. MAHMOUD takes an exacting look at racism against Middle Eastern immigrants, homophobia within immigrant communities, and media-created stigmas surrounding Iranian (and Middle Eastern) culture.
MAHMOUD plays Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays at 8pm, Sundays at 6pm, January 10 through January 27, 2013 at the Santa Monica Playhouse. Admission is $30. For tickets and show information, please visit www.mahmoutaxi.tix.com or call 800-504-4849.
[ART EXHIBIT]Reverberations of Blue: Negin Sharifzadeh
In the first Los Angeles solo exhibition 
of artist Negin Sharifzadeh, Reverberations of Blue brings together Negin Sharfizadeh’s award-winning stop-motion animated film, Even Gray Feels Blue, and a series of sculptural works and hand-painted canvas prints drawn out of the filmmaking process. The film was built in conversation with In turn, composed and performed by Bouban and based on the poem, The Last Turn, by Ahmad Shamlou.
Even Gray Feels Blue was born out of the process of adapting Sharifzadeh’s sculptural practice into the language of stop-motion animation, while the objects created for the show return this conversation back to the sculptural realm.
For more information visit www.neginsharifzadeh.com, on view January 12 through January 19, 2013, at Seyhoun Gallery, Los Angeles.
[EXHIBIT]
Cyrus Cylinder at
Museum of Fine Arts
The Cyrus Cylinder is a 2600-year old object of modern 
importance, and a symbol of multi-culturalism, tolerance, diversity, and human rights. The Cylinder will visit the US for the first time in 2013 through a national tour officially sponsored by IHF America. It will be on exhibit in five major museums across the country, giving many a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to see the iconic artifact.
From The British Museum, the cylinder is inscribed in cuneiform on orders from Persian emperor Cyrus the Great following his defeat of Babylon in 539 BCE. The ancient clay charter introduces the new king as a reformer bringing peace throughout Mesopotamia (modern day Iraq). The document extols Cyrus’ efforts to rebuild temples destroyed by his Babylonian predecessors and to repatriate those displaced and captured by the old regime.
Tour dates:
Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, Smithsonian Institution Washington, USA
9 March – 28 April 2013
The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, USA
3 May – 14 June 2013
The Metropolitan Museum of Art,
New York, USA
20 June – 4 August 2013
Asian Art Museum, San Francisco, USA
9 August – 22 September 2013
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, USA
2 October – 2 December 2013