An open letter   From: Iranian artists To: Artists across the world 19 March 2020   We, regardless of our nationality or origin, belong to a borderless and utopic territory called “art”, located in a universe named “culture”; no power can deprive us from holding this shared identity.    Thanks to our inborn cultural understanding in this shared land of wonder, we the artists, from Asia, Europe, America or Africa, enjoy the privilege of influencing the public opinion and the ability to transform unfavoured conditions.   We all have experienced narrating about love and hatred, peace and war, knowledge and ignorance, good and evil and vice and virtue as well as salvation and redemption—through our works of art—in light of our self-motivated cultural wisdom and quality. We are gifted, thanks to our artworks, to have envisioned a universe much bigger than the community we physically live or the country we belong to by our nationality.   Artificial enmity, factitious divisions, false biases and negative stereotyping concocted by political powers to cause us distanced from each other, have only made us more determined to keep together and become more capable and influential through collective solidarity.   Now, all of us—from any faith or geographical location- face a common and powerful enemy that is rapidly spreading from one place to another, ravaging our towns and cities and terrorizing our fellow human beings; we are equally vulnerable to this invisible microscopic foe, and no single man will feel safe unless and until it is contained everywhere.   COVID-19 is not only a fatal virus which necessitates maximum prevention and costly cure; it poses a simple but historic ethical question on how the community of nations interact and cooperate to defeat this common existential threat.   While every nation, big or small, is devising their own way to battle corona pandemic, the Iranian nation has to fight an additional challenge, i.e., unilateral sanctions, which are hampering its struggle against coronavirus.   The injustice caused by US' unilateral sanctions has left the Iranians handcuffed in tackling the COVID-19 pandemic. The sanctions have made innocent Iranians more vulnerable to this disease by depriving Iranian patients of necessary medicine and medical care.   It is heartbreaking to see that politics seem to have found in corona outbreak an opportunity to further hit where it hurts most by tightening unjust pressure against the Iranian nation. But we, as the artists representing the shared sense of humanity, are expected to stand up against whatever divides human beings and denigrates humanity.   It is only expected from the world’s freedom-loving artists—already facing the same serious menace—to ask for a human response to the question of “corona”; a response that emanates from our shared humanity and transcends power politics and short-sighted geopolitical whims.     The corona crisis shall be, sooner or later, defused with less or more tolls; however, its shared but different stories will remain with us and recounted for coming generations forever—the story of exhausted nurses who danced on the contaminated hospital floors just to keep the spirits of patients and colleagues up and direct their attentions away from the shortage of medicine and equipment; the story of physicians who refused to go home for weeks and browsed, with no protective mask, gloves or gown, among patients being treated in the corridors or on the floors of hospitals.   These all shall remain stored in the world’s historical memory and will be narrated sooner or later—by you or us—for the generations to come. If only it could not become too late for the most influential and dedicated artists of the world—who may not have the opportunity again—to narrate to politicians and powerful leaders the story of the brutality of sanctions against the people of Iran during the corona crisis. The people of Iran are today facing double crises: a common crisis called “coronavirus” which you perfectly know; and the crisis of “sanctions” which we hope you never ever come to know For us the Iranian artists, it is now important to know how you—the world’s artists—think and react to alleviate the pain and suffering of corona patients and vulnerable children and the elderly in Iran as well as the devastating shortage of medicine and equipment the Iranian big-hearted health practitioners are suffering in their tough fight with this dreadful outbreak.   Respectfully yours,   Signed by (in alphabetical    List of signatories (so far):   Anahid Abad Akbar Azad Poyan Azadeh Negar Azarbaijani Ali Ashtiani-Pour Amir Asna-Ashari Saman Ehteshami Habib Ahmadzadeh Mostafa Ahmadi Hamid Ahya Pourya Akhvas Pirouz Arjmand Bahman Ardalan Homayoun Assadian Habib Esmaeili Mahnaz Afzali Javad Afshar Bahareh Afshari Navid Afqah Kamand Amir-Soleimani Mazda Ansari Borzu Arjmand Sattar Ouraki Ibrahim Iraj-Zad Shayesteh Irani Behdad Babaei Kourosh Babaei Tina Bakhshi Bahram Bedakhshani Babak Borzouyeh Marzieh Boroumand Rakhshan Bani-E’temd Ali Boustan Hossein Behrouzi-Nia Behzad Behzadpour Behnam Behzadi Seyyed Mohammad Beheshti Nazanin Bayati Hossein Pakdel Elham Paveh-Nejad Parviz Parastoui Pantea Panahiha Kioumars Pour-Ahmad Hassan Pour-Shirzai Tahmures Pour-Nazeri Sohrab Pour-Nazeri Keykhosro Pour-Nazeri Kiarash Pouzeshi Dariush Pir-Niakan Mohammad Pirhadi Afshin Pirhashemi Iraj Taghi-Pour Parviz Tanavoli Kourosh Tahami Tina Jame-Garmi Ardavan Ja’farian Ali Jafari Poyan Ali Jalilvand Vahid Jalilvand Rouhollah Hejazi Hadi Hejazi-Far Farshad Hesami Hassan Hassan-Doust Mohammad Ali Hossein-Nejad Ibrahim Haghighi Shahab Hosseini Sepideh Khosrojah Hooman Khala’tbari Reza Dadvie Mohammad Reza Delpak Bahram Radan Shadmehr Rastin Kamran Rasoulzadeh Christophe Rezai Habib Rezaei Gholam Reza Rezaei A’tefeh Razavi Amir Shahab Razavian Ali Rahbari Hassan Riahi Ali Reza Raisian Leila Zare’ Ali Reza Zarin-Dast Salar Zamanian Jalil Saman Amir Abbas Setayeshgar Abbas Sajadi Pourya Sarayie Mohammad Sarir Saeed Sa’di Mahdi Sa’di Masoud Salami Kourosh Soleimani Sae’d Soheili Hooman Seidi Ghazal Shakeri Mohsen Shah-Ibrahimi Ali Reza Shoja-Nouri Homayoun Shajarian Mohsen Sharifian Masoud Shoari Mahdi Shirzad Abdol Vahab Shahidi Ahad Sadeghi Majid Salehi Rasoul Sadr-Ameli Behrouz Safarian Fereshteh Taerpour Tanaz Tabatabai Mahyar Tarihi Behzad Abdi Ahamd A’rbani Mohammad Mahdi Asgharpour Aria Azimi-Nejad Ali-Reza Alavian Hossein Alizadeh Behrouz Gharibpour Mojtaba Askari Hatef Alimardani Homayoun Ghani-Zadeh Hossein Ghiasi Alireza A’sar Sahab Elm Sina Elm Media Faraj-Nejad Mehrdad Farid Mehran Farhadi Arash Farhangfar Arash Ghanadi Amir Ghanadi Soroush Ghahramanlou Farzaneh Kaboli Abdoljabbar Kakaei Ardeshir Kamkar Houshang Kamkar Mohammad Hadi Karimi Niki Karimi Ashkan Kamangari Bardia Kiaras Reza Kianian Mostafa Kiai Milad Kiai Milad Key-Maram Masoud Kimiaei Soheila Golestani Houshang Golmakani Davood Ghanjei Mohammad Reza Gohari Hamid Motebasem Kourosh Matin Navid Mohammad-Zadeh Milad Mohammadi Amir Mardaneh Hadi Marzban Shabnam Moghadami Hassan Mostafavi Majid Matlabi Hamid Reza Monabati Seyyed Gholam-Reza Mousavi Meysam Moulaei Reza Mahdavi Hossein Mahkam Bijan Mir-Bagheri Mojtaba Mirtahmasb Maziar Miri Shahin Najaf-Zadeh Mehrdad Nosrati Omid Nemati Hamidreza Nour-Bakhsh Javad Nouroz-Beigi Afshin Hashemi Karen Homayounfar Mohammad Reza Honarmand Hossein Yari Abbas Yari Reza Yazdani   And all artists who will sign this letter…