Hossein Kazemi (Iranian, 1924 - 1996)

From 1961 onwards Kazemi started experimenting with pure abstraction, and when he returned to figurative painting, as he did with his stone-and-flower paintings of the late 1960s, it was in a more abstracted mould, with strong symbolic overtones hinting at Mithraism. This theme continued for the rest of his career, variations and different combinations of flowers and stones, sometimes lacking one or the other element and becoming increasingly abstract.