Known as one of the original founders of the neo traditionalist Saqqakhaneh movement, Charles Hossein Zenderoudi enrolled at the Tehran College of Decorative Arts to study painting in mid 1950s. The artist’s interest in traditional Islamic material culture and aesthetics – most notably Persian calligraphy led him to develop his distinctive abstract compositions, dense with dots, letter and numbers.
On moving to Paris in the early 1960s in order to focus on his painting, Zenderoudi met celebrated artists like Alberto Giacometti Lucio Fontana and Stephen Poliakoff and was invited to participate in prestigious biennales such as Venice (1960) and São Paolo (1961) in which he won awards. His big international break came in 1963 when his work, K+L+32+H+4 was acquired by MOMA, New York, leading others to follow suit, his work is now held in many of the leading international art institutions in North America, Europe and the Middle East, including the British Museum, London; Grey Collection, New York; Beaubourg Center, George Pompidou, Paris and Mathaf Museum, Doha. Also Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art
The artist lives in Malakoff, France and continues to work in Meaux, France.
Zenderoudi studied relief printmaking at the atelier of Marcos Grigorian, the leading Iranian modern master during his primary studies at the fine art school of Tehran. He made his most famous linocut “Who is this Hossein the world is crazy about?” (1958) during this course.
Later at the drawing classes of his teacher and patron, Parviz Tanavoli at the Tehran College of Decorative Arts he created his monotypes which exhibited them at the Atelier Kaboud, the leading art space in Tehran founded by Parviz Tanavoli.
Since then, printmaking was always one his primary techniques for creating some of his very important pieces such as LE CORAN (THE QUR'AN) and has exhibited his prints several times at his group and solo exhibitions.