Hojjatullah Shakiba is one of the contemporary Iranian painters known for his photorealistic and archeological paintings. Shakiba's acquaintance with art dates back to his childhood. His father was one of the Gorgon's photographers and created usom-made paintings. Shakiba helped his father with photography and retouched the black-and-white portraits his father took from people. At the same time he participated in the Gorgan High School Painting Competition and won. This success doubled his motivation. He learned oil painting from a person named Jalalian and later went to the Boys' Fine Arts Conservatory and graduated with a diploma in painting.
He was not attracted to the academic approaches of art and after graduation he tried to find an independent way for his personal desires. In the meantime, he engaged in advertisement to make a living. It was during this period that he created the large-scale photorealistic collection of banknotes. Paintings that contained playful eye tricks that misled the viewer into distinguishing between reality and painting. He continued his painting career with photographic images and created paintings based on old family photographs. Of course, in reconstructing these photographs, he did not remain faithful to the original images and interfered in the composition, colors or elements within the image according to his painting needs or feelings.
His inclination to antiquity merged with archaic tendencies and gradually built a quasi-historical quality in his paintings. Shakiba created paintings on the subject of ancient Iran which present a romantic, nostalgic and dreamlike image of past glory. Images like a beautiful woman holding a crown on her head, a lotus branch in her hand and standing in front of the remains of Achaemenid and Sassanid buildings. Sometimes kings and soldiers come to life on the stone reliefs of the palace and embrace these women. These historical fantasies are a response to the painter's longing for the past.
In 1976 Shakiba exhibited his works at Seyhoun Gallery for the first time. Two years after the exhibition of his works at Bal in Switzerland, in 1979 he held a solo exhibition in London. His works have been showcased many times individually and in groups in countries such as the United States, Canada, the United Arab Emirates, etc. A selection of his works have been published in a book called "Shakiba's Paintings". Javad Mojabi has written a commentary on Shakiba's works in the introduction of this book.