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Ronaldo and Me: The Disabled Iranian Painter Who Shot to Fame

August 7, 2017
IranWire Citizen Journalist
4 min read
Fatemeh Hamami painting a portrait of Iranian football star Ali Daei
Fatemeh Hamami painting a portrait of Iranian football star Ali Daei
Footballer Ali Daei with his portrait painted by Fatemeh Hamami
Footballer Ali Daei with his portrait painted by Fatemeh Hamami
Dr. YoungHoon Kwaak, president of the World Citizens Organization, kissing the hand of Fatemeh Hamami
Dr. YoungHoon Kwaak, president of the World Citizens Organization, kissing the hand of Fatemeh Hamami
Fatemeh Hamami and her portrait of Real Madrid star footballer Cristiano Ronaldo
Fatemeh Hamami and her portrait of Real Madrid star footballer Cristiano Ronaldo

The following article was written by an Iranian citizen journalist on the ground inside the country, who writes under a pseudonym to protect his identity.

 

A disabled artist has hit the headlines for her portrait of Real Madrid Star Cristiano Ronaldo — which she painted using her feet. 

The artist, Fatemeh Hamami, completed the portrait last week and immediately posted a photograph of it on her Instagram page, which has close to 33,000 followers. “I’d love it if Cristiano Ronaldo could see my work,” she wrote. “I hope he does, because you are with me, my dear god.”

More than 50,000 people liked her post, and Ronaldo himself tweeted his praise: “This is a passion with no limits,” he wrote. 

Hamami is used to painting stars. She has done portraits of famous Iranian actors Dariush Arjomand, Jamshid Mashayekhi, Parviz Parastui, Reza Rooygari, Mehran Modiri and Rambod Javan, the TV football commentator Adel Ferdosipour and the football star Ali Daei. Prior to the current fame, the portrait of Daei also brought her to the attention of the public. 

Fatemeh Hamami Nasrabadi was born on February 1, 1989 in the small town of Sefid Shahr in Isfahan province. She was the second-born of twins, born after her sister Zahra. When Fatemah was born, doctors told her mother that she had been deprived of oxygen. It soon became clear that was severely physically disabled. It didn’t take her mother long, however, to fully accept her daughter’s disability. She decided to send Fatemeh to a normal primary school because, even before her daughter had turned seven, she could see that she was doing many of her everyday chores using her feet.

In school, Hamami took the pen between her toes to write. She went to school with her twin until the fifth grade but her family was suffering from financial difficulties, so Fatemeh had no choice to drop out. 

A few years later, however, she was able to attend a school for special needs children in the nearby city of Kashan. There she studied through to the third year of middle school. Although her talent might have benefitted from a more advanced education, it was at this school that she came to know Saeed Boujar Arani, and both their lives changed.

Arani was born in 1970 and has a graduate degree in road construction. But for the last 20 years, he has been mostly engaged in teaching drawing and painting in Kashan. In 2004, he decided to make a documentary about the students at Kashan’s special needs school. An instructor there showed Arani one of the student’s sketchbooks — and what he saw amazed him. The sketchbook featured black-ink drawings by a girl, and the instructor claimed the girl had done all the drawings using her feet. 

Saeed Boujar Arani began teaching Fatemeh Hamami, and although he never made his documentary, in less than 10 years, he had helped Hamami become a prominent figure in Iran’s art scene.

In spring 2016, Dr. YoungHoon Kwaak, the president of the World Citizens Organization (WCO), traveled to Iran to meet with Fatemeh Hamami after hearing about her wonderful drawings. 

“When I saw Fatemeh Hamami working up close, I was so moved that I cried,” said Dr. Kwaak. “To show my respect for all this talent and work and hope for life, I kissed her hand.” He also made Fatemeh Hamami an honorary member of the World Citizens Organization.

When I met Hamami, she was unassuming and modest.  “I love light-colored dresses and costume jewelry,” she said. “I have used my feet instead of my hands since I was three and I have no problem using computers and mobile phones.”

Hamami draws with color pencils or black ink, and Iranian media have published images of her watercolors and oil paintings of famous people.  

Footballer Ali Daei was reportedly impressed with Hamami’s portrait of him. Then when he learned that his portrait had been painted by a woman who suffers from disability across 85 percent of her body, he thanked her on his Instagram page and invited her to visit Naft Football Team training camp where he was coaching. On January 4, 2017, Hamami visited the camp, and after a warm welcome from Daei, presented the star with his portrait as a gift.

Less than nine months later, she had completed her portrait of Cristiano Ronaldo. The portrait is so well executed that it’s difficult to believe that a disabled person painted it with her feet. But it’s clear that she has commanded a space for herself in Iran’s competitive art scene, and in the hearts of the Iranian public. 

 

Sanaz Kalantari, Citizen journalist

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