My name is Shala Etemadzadeh, Jamal,
a vision artist and art instructor.
I was exposed in an artistic family
and was surrendered by culture, art and literature.
And my father, who was a well-known and recognized
author and translator, he was associated, you know,
with artists, writers, poets, singers, actors.
And that was in this atmosphere that I grew up.
That was in the late 60s that I passed an entrance examination
in the University of Tehran, the Faculty of Arts.
First, a portrait that I took at home and showed to my father.
And my father was so excited.
And he asked me to put his pen name, which
was Behazin, on my work.
And I was so surprised how he proposed me
to put his name on my artboard.
And I said, no, you are Behazin, and I am Etemadzadeh.
So I am going to stay with my own name.
And then my father smiled and said,
look, it's better to put Behazin, Shala Behazin.
I said, no, I'm not going.
Just I'm going to put Shala.
Just I put Shala for that period of time.
And when we got married, we moved to Germany.
After we settled down, somebody asked us
to have an art show, joint work together.
And she proposed that my name is Toulon, Etemadzadeh Toulon,
and German is short.
So it's better to have the name Jamal for my signature,
because you are a couple with two names.
And if you want to expose yourself faster,
it's better to have just one name.
And in Germany, it's common that women carry their husband's
name. It's much better to have Jamal.
And from then, I changed just Shala to Shala E,
which is the initial of Etemadzadeh, Jamal.
So I can say that this is almost more than 35 years
that I'm involved in art.
And I did live in many countries.
And my eye opened to different cultures, different arts,
and inspired from them.
And then when I moved to Toronto,
it's actually 13 years that we live here in Toronto.
My vision to art has changed.
And I thought maybe it's good to be
related to my culture, to my identity.
So I started to study about the treasures
and all the ancient art in Iran.
And the result was my latest series
called Nostalgia Museum.
And these 40 pieces are chained together.
But each has its voice individually.
I believe on graphic matters and painting together,
as you see in my work, they are minimalized,
very specific in one object.
And these objects, it's not just object,
but they are related to history, to culture,
to identity, to imagination of our artists.
That's it.
