Celebrated Iranian Artist Hassanzadeh Dies of Alcohol Poisoning

Renowned Iranian painter and actor Khosrow Hassanzadeh passed away on July 2 after drinking bootleg alcohol, amid a recent surge in cases of fatal alcohol poisoning in the country.

Hassanzadeh was born in Tehran in 1963 to a working class family. He studied painting at the Faculty of Art and Persian Literature of Tehran’s Azad University, while being mentored by Aydin Aghdashloo, a renowned painter, graphic designer, author and film critic.   

The artist, whose works often deal with issues that are considered sensitive in Iranian society, is often referred to as a “political” artist. 

His work featured in many exhibitions in Europe and the Middle East and is held by prestigious museums, including the British Museum, the Los Angeles Museum of Fine Arts, Houston’s Museum of Fine Arts, the Agha Khan Museum in Toronto and the Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art.

Maziar Bahari, a filmmaker and IranWire founder and editor in chief, made a film about Hassanzadeh in 1999, “Paint! No Matter What,” when the artist was working as a fruit seller in Tehran.

The consumption of “counterfeit alcohol” or industrial alcohol has killed dozens of people in recent weeks.

Abbas Masjedi Arani, the head of Iran's Forensic Medicine Organization, said earlier this month that 644 people died from “alcohol poisoning” during the past Iranian year, which ended in March. That represented a 30 percent increase compared to the previous year, he said.

Alcohol has been banned in Iran Since the 1979 Islamic Revolution, but Iranians still drink foreign and homemade alcoholic beverages that are sold on the black market.

Iranians are increasingly turning to cheap homemade alcohol because many can no longer afford to buy foreign-made beverages amid a deepening economic crisis which has seen growing inflation, unemployment and poverty.