Asked in an interview to choose a rug for everyday life, Mohammad Reza Rashtizadeh chose his father's sunflower design and said he had rewoven it. Such choices give concrete form to this father-and-son tradition in Qom. The son carries forward Ali's flowers, trees and open space, using new colours and artistic collaborations to bring his father's aesthetic into today's life.
Works and style
Contemporary works
Mohammad Reza's collaborative works weave intercultural subjects into Persian patterns, with material proportions and colour participating in the expression. Viewers can trace connections between subject, pattern and colour. Joint creation with collaborating artists and reweaving Ali's originals have their own qualities, revealing contemporary ideas and the continuation of tradition respectively.
People and heritage
Family continuity diagram
Ali Rashtizadeh valued colour, pattern and proportion, working with painters to develop classical designs. His son Mohammad Reza learned from him as a boy and later continued design, weaving guidance and material selection, bringing his father's tradition into contemporary works.
Earlier mastersAli Rashtizadeh
First generation · historical figure
Ali Rashtizadeh
Historical rug making and pattern development
Second generation
Mohammad Reza Rashtizadeh
Design and weaving guidance
Parent's generation: Ali Rashtizadeh
Sources on family continuity
Public family information ↗People and heritage
Family archive
Ali came to Qom around 1939 and began with handspun wool; by 2026, the family's weaving history approaches ninety years. His son Mohammad Reza lived in Paris for thirty-three years, later returning to Iran at his father's request and continuing the workshop after his father's death. Reweaving his father's sunflowers also meant reconsidering how flowers, trees, colours and spaces form a complete rug.
Mohammad Reza and collaborating artists connect intercultural subjects with Persian patterns. Shared concepts, material selection and colour all contribute to the expression. Collaborative creation and reweaving a father's originals have different origins, showing different ways in which family art continues.