The Persian New Year, known as Nowruz, coincides with the spring equinox and is considered the most important day of the year. After 12 days of honoring life through visits with family and friends and celebrating with good food and company, the holidays end on the 13th day. This day is marked by special ceremonies. It is important to spend this day outside in nature with family, making knots on grasses in the hope that your wishes for the year will come true. The tradition encourages people to leave their homes—where they have been celebrating, hosting, and resting for the past 12 days—symbolically to get rid of the 13th day, which is viewed as a metaphor for unholiness, bad luck, and negative omens. This Day is Known as "Sizdah Be Dar" which means "getting rid of the 13." In Recent years, this day is also known as the Nature Day.
In the spring of 1404-2025, hosted by Hicycle!_Iran, we organized an environmental art event called "Zobaleh Be Dar," meaning "getting rid of litter," on Hormoz Island in southern Iran. Collaborating with Mostafa Ataei and Mouhebat Khodaei, the event took place on the 13th day of Nowrooz to raise awareness about the pollution crisis affecting this beautiful island. Hormoz Island is a geologically unique salt dome in the Persian Gulf, known for its rich mineral diversity and vividly colored soils, particularly its iconic red ochre. Unfortunately, the island is facing significant pollution due to excessive tourism and a lack of recycling infrastructure. We invited artists living there to create artworks and installations using litter and trash collected from the island. As this year coincided with the start of the Year of the Snake in Chinese tradition, we decided to incorporate a snake theme into the event. We came up with the idea of creating a large puppet snake to be built by the community, representing our collective efforts for a cleaner and greener island. This monstrous puppet was created from abandoned diesel "mashks"—large, rugged plastic fuel bladders that are often used in underwater fuel smuggling and had washed ashore after being discarded at sea. These containers, which could be found scattered every few meters along Hormoz's beaches, formed the scales and body of a 40-meter-long snake, collaboratively assembled by island residents and artists. By reclaiming these haunting remnants of environmental exploitation, the snake puppet slithered through the landscape as both a symbol of transformation and a stark reminder of the human impact on the island's fragile ecosystem.
"We are tying knots with strands of fabric while wishing for a greener and cleaner island. As we move the puppet together in harmony, we remind ourselves of our collective responsibility and the actions that must be taken to make this dream a reality. "
