The Ultimate Penalty

"The Ultimate Penalty"

Oil on canvas, 36" x 36", 2005

Not available for sale

Click on the picture to see a large size

When I saw this article posted by a fellow artist at the D`art café (Fine-art.com), I couldn’t forget about it for some time, I just knew that I have to do a painting about it.

Here is the article:

LONDON, July 21 – Two gay teenagers were publicly executed in Iran on 19 July 2005 for the ‘crime’ of homosexuality.

One youth was aged 18 and the other was a minor (age 16).

They were only identified by their initials, M.A. and A.M.

According to the reports from ICNA, the boys showed a lot of remorse for their action minutes before their deaths.

One of them said in the court:

“14 months ago we were arrested. We are very sorry for what we did. Our advice to the other youths is to think about their family and put their focus into school and their life.
We did not know that such acts will result in death penalty. We grew up in a tough conditions where such crimes were prevalent, which is why we committed such crimes”.

There were objections, mostly concerning their ages, but eventually the death penalty was given.

The so-called offenses took place more than a year earlier, when the boys
were possibly around the age of 16.
They were hanged at 10 am (local time) on Tuesday in Edalat (Justice) Square in downtown Mashad.