Homa Taj

Heighten vigilance regarding Iranian cultural heritage - In light of escalating instability in Iran and the increased risk to cultural heritage that typically accompanies such periods, IMPD International Museum Professionals Day (Est. 2014) urge museums, auction houses, dealers, and private collectors worldwide to apply heightened professional due diligence to any object of Persian/Iranian origin or with a plausible Iranian provenance. For acquisitions, consignments, and transfers from 1 January 2026 onward, acquiring entities should be ready to provide clear, verifiable documentation demonstrating lawful export, uninterrupted provenance, and compliance with applicable national laws and international instruments, including relevant UNESCO conventions. Pleases Sign the Petition! c.org/MFxHmyT9Zh via @Change

UNESCO has a refined talent for handling ancient inheritances: praise them lavishly, scatter them across a map, and quietly misplace their birth certificate. Its treatment of Nowruz is a beautiful example of the form. On Instagram, UNESCO declares that “in times of uncertainty, the spirit of Nowruz reminds us of the importance of hope, dialogue, solidarity and respect for our shared humanity.” Around 21 March, it says, many communities welcome spring through traditions tied to nature, renewal, the equinox, fire, water, music, dance, games, and family gatherings. All of this is pleasant, true, and upholstered in the soothing fabric of international cultural diplomacy. Yet the prose glides around the central fact with suspicious grace: Nowruz is an ancient Iranian feast... museumviews.com/nowruz-and-the…

@Telegraph @KiszelyPhilip Why is Antisemitic put in quotation mark?

An “anti-Semitic” art exhibition with drawings allegedly showing Jewish people eating babies was seemingly promoted by a Labour council ⤵️ telegraph.co.uk/news/2026/03/2…

یونسکو این جشن باستانیِ بهاری را چونان پیروزیِ انسانیتِ مشترک گرامی می‌دارد. اما کمتر مایل است آشکارا و بی‌پرده بگوید که نوروز، در نام، فارسی است؛ در زادگاه، ایرانی است؛ و یکی از بزرگ‌ترین بازمانده‌های جهانِ ایرانیِ پیشااسلامی به‌شمار می‌آید. UNESCO celebrates the ancient spring festival as a triumph of shared humanity. It is less eager to say, plainly, that Nowruz is Persian in name, Iranian in cradle, and one of the great survivals of the pre-Islamic Iranian world. museumviews.com/nowruz-and-the…

نوروز ۲۵۸۵ پیروز سال نو، مثل همیشه، با سنبل و آینه و آتش از راه می‌رسد؛ با همان نبوغ دیرین ایرانی برای دوام آوردن. اما امسال، درهای بعضی از عزیزترین مکان‌های تاریخی ایران بسته مانده‌اند. حافظ در سکوت است. تخت جمشید پشت درهای قفل‌شده چشم به راه است. هگمتانه، که از همهٔ بیانیه‌هایی که به نامش صادر شده کهن‌تر است، همان‌جا ایستاده که همیشه بوده: ناظر. نوروز هیچ‌وقت سهم آسودگی نبوده است. نوروز از آنِ نو شدن است، از آنِ ایستادگی، از آنِ این پافشاری سالانه که زمستان حق ندارد آخرین جمله را بگوید. پس به استقبال این سال می‌رویم با اندوه، با وقار، و با ابرویی که کمی بالا رفته است. با حافظه‌ای که هنوز سر جایش است. با آتشی که هنوز روشن است. با این باور، هرچند این روزها خوشایندِ قدرت نباشد، که فرهنگ از آنِ مردم است، نه قدرت. نوروز پیروز.
باشد که روشنایی، حتی از پشت درهای بسته، راه خودش را پیدا کند.

Nowruz 2585 at the Threshold A new year arrives, as it always does, with hyacinths, mirrors, fire, and that old Persian genius for survival. But this year, some of Iran’s most beloved historical sites stand closed. Tom of Hafez is hushed. Persepolis waits behind locked gates. Hegmataneh (Ecbatana), older than every official statement ever issued in its name, remains where it has always been: watching. Nowruz has never belonged to comfort. It belongs to renewal, to defiance, to the annual insistence that winter does not get the last line. So we greet this year with grief, resilience, and tremendous hope for a free and prosperous IRan. With memory intact. With fire intact. With the unfashionable conviction that culture belongs to people, not power. Nowruz Piruz. May light enter, even through locked doors. museumviews.com/nowruz-2585-at…

Empress Farah's Architecture of Patronage, Part I museumviews.substack.com/publish/post/1…

@policenama1401 @grok is this AI generated?

لوکیشن دیروز پوزیده 👇 #IranRevolution2026‌

@fanazer Beautiful ~

عید مبارک 💫 🎨 🇸🇦 رائدة عاشور Raeda Ashour

@SGhasseminejad نوروز ۲۵۸۵ پیروز ~

پیام نوروزی شاهدخت ولیعهد نور پهلوی

@SGhasseminejad Nowruz 2585 Pirouz ~

Princess Iman Pahlavi’s Norooz message: “This Norooz carries a new meaning within it; it holds a light at its heart, a light born of a nation that has chosen to wait no longer.”

@khansarinia Nowruz 2585 Pirouz ~

At the exact moment of Norouz, a rainbow appeared above Tehran. The moment of Iran’s liberation is near.

@E_Aria_N @SinaMihandoost Sadistic. As always.

Yesterday, on the eve of the Iranian New Year (Nowruz), the Islamic Republic hanged five teenagers who had been detained during the January protests in the cities of Qom and Ilam. Today, 18-year-old Melika Azizi from the city of Rasht, who was arrested for burning regime symbols during the protests, faces imminent execution in Rasht prison on the charge of Moharebeh (waging war against Allah). #IranMassacre‌ won't stop!

Heritage Vandalism in Iran: When the State Tries to Put Looting in a Suit Heritage Vandalism is not only the instant a monument is struck. It is also the patient manufacture of conditions in which the strike becomes profitable, lawful-looking, or politically convenient. It is the refusal to guard an archaeological site. It is the reduction of a protected historic zone by ministerial order. It is the conversion of collective inheritance into a revenue model. It is the replacement of stewardship with appetite. museumviews.com/heritage-vanda… #Iran #heritage

When the State Counts the Ruins in the Dark Iran's heritage needs accountability by insistence: "Insistence on independent documentation. Insistence on photographs, condition reports, site-by-site assessments, testimony from local staff and conservators, and credible outside monitoring. Insistence on precision." museumviews.com/when-the-state… #Iran #heritage

The Magic Lantern Before the Fire museumviews.com/the-magic-lant…

About last night's #Oscars! The Magic Lantern Under Fire "Last night, Oscar night performed its usual sleight of hand: a blizzard of glamour, a few victors, a few bruised egos, and the annual miracle by which moral vanity arrives in couture. We watched Hollywood “royalty,” and their descendants, swaddled in enough satin to upholster a minor monarchy, complete with queens, tiaras, and princesses who often deride Iranian constitutional monarchists, rise in standing ovation for a white-saviour multimillionaire, Javier Bardem, delivering his “No to War, Free Palestine” speech. This from the same Hollywood “royalty” that earlier this year, less than five weeks ago, found no urgency, no cameras, no trembling conscience, when tens of thousands of Iranians were being beaten, abducted, illegally jailed, raped, tortured, and slaughtered by the Islamic Republic..." museumviews.com/the-magic-lant…