Farah Ossouli was one of the first artists to appropriate miniature paintings as an authentic, personal, and contemporary artistic expression to portray women’s lives.

Ossouli’s style evolved over three decades after the 1979 revolution and cultural isolation in Iran. Searching for a meaningful form of self-expression, she found it in the rich tradition and refined beauty of Persian paintings, architecture, and decorative arts. The impassive look of miniature figures was well suited to her universal themes of female and male protagonists.

Born in 1953 in Zanjan, Iran, she graduated from Tehran High School of Fine Arts (Honarestane Honarhaye Ziba) in 1971, and received her B.A. from the Department of Fine Arts (Daneshkadeye Honaryae Ziba), Tehran University, Iran in 1977. After 1979, it propelled Ossouli to pioneer and revitalize miniature paintings, which was one of the many genres she had studied in art school as a painter. She has also exhibited internationally in the Middle East, Europe, Africa, North America, and Asia.

Her works is widely collected, most recently by the The Metropolitan Museum Of Art, New York, USA; Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, USA; Devi Art Foundation, New Delhi, India; Bank Of Pasargad, Imam Ali Religious Arts Museum, Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art, and the Koran Museum, all Tehran, Iran; Tropen Museum, Amsterdam, Netherlands; and the Ludwig Museum, Koblenz, Germany.