“I couldn’t get into Iran, so I brought Iran here,” says graphic designer Yossi Lemel, who together with Czech curator Marta Sylvestrova put together the exhibit “Sign from Iran,” on display at the Museum of Islamic Art in Jerusalem until November 19.

“Non-western culture fascinates me and I believe that we have to learn from it,” he adds. “I’m bringing a new message and a new culture that I’m excited about. There is deep content and a love for design and aesthetics.”

Lemel’s interest in Iranian culture began when he was a graphic design student at the Bezalel Academy of Art and Design 30 years ago. In the early 2000s he visited the International Graphic Design Biennial in Brno, Czech Republic, where artists from Tehran displayed works that exemplified the graphic revolution that had swept the country. He met Mehdi Saeedi, a leading young Iranian-born designer, in 2008 in Mexico.

After Iran’s general election results triggered the 2009 Green Movement, led by Mir Hossein Mousavi, numerous posters were created to support it; Lemel designed some of the posters and connected with other Iranian designers. Two years ago Lemel and Saeedi met again, this time in Turkey.

“He was more open with me and suggested that I do an exhibit, and he gave me a new book,” Lemel says. “He said he wouldn’t be able to do an exhibit with me, but he was sure I’d find a way to bring the works over.” He brought the posters over by cooperating with galleries displaying Iranian art. For months Lemel and other curators pored over the works kept in the Moravian Gallery in Brno, as well as Berlin and Trnava in Slovakia.

Open gallery view A poster by Mehdi Saeedi from the "Sign from Iran" exhibition. Credit: Courtesy of Moravian Gallery, Brno, Czech Republic

The Jerusalem exhibit is divided by subject. The first part displays works of the founding fathers of Iranian poster art, whose works from the 1970s were influenced by international design trends. For instance, a poster by Ghobad Shiva for the 11th annual arts festival in Shiraz features a mythological Assyrian figure that was inspired by a poster Milton Glazer designed for Bob Dylan in 1966.

Another part of the exhibition shows posters of a social and political nature along with works by design and art department graduates in Iran. Because the Iranian regime does not grant artists the freedom to fully express themselves, they’ve developed a graphic language that uses visual puns, metaphors, and indirect messages. Ramyar Vala couldn’t use obvious imagery in a poster he designed in 2009 for an organization that helps HIV carriers, so he used a banana as a phallic symbol and covered it in golden armor.

Shahrzad Changalvaee designed the poster that appears on the exhibition’s catalogue. In it she wears a dress with long sleeves that leaves her thighs and legs exposed. In the background is a quote from Persian poet Omar Khayyam, “Take heed, hold fast the rope of mother wit.” Fragments of letters from the poem hide her face.

In contrast to fields such as fashion design, industrial design and architecture, which are so influenced by globalization that the final products look similar all over the world, the alphabet in these posters preserves the local identity. The posters integrate the clean minimalism that characterizes contemporary art with the complexity that informs Persian typography.

Open gallery view Yossi Lemel. Credit: Hanan Bar Assouline

Open gallery view A poster by Mehdi Saeedi from the "Sign from Iran" exhibition. Credit: Courtesy of Moravian Gallery, Brno, Czech Republic

Open gallery view A poster by Morteza Momayez from the "Sign from Iran" exhibition. Credit: Courtesy of Moravian Gallery, Brno, Czech Republic

Open gallery view A poster by Ramyar Vala from the "Sign from Iran" exhibition. Credit: Courtesy of Moravian Gallery, Brno, Czech Republic