Mahboobeh Kalaee

Mahboobeh Kalaee (1992, Iran) is an Iranian animation filmmaker, writer, and artist known for her experimental and poetic style.

In her works, she often combines different media such as live action, 2D animation, and stop-motion to create surreal narratives that explore the relationship between tangible reality and imagination. She completed her studies in 2015 at the University of Tehran’s Faculty of Fine Arts with a BA in Industrial Design and earned an MA in Animation Directing from the University of Art in Tehran in 2020.

Kalaee’s films, particularly her short film "The Fourth Wall", have received international recognition and numerous awards from renowned festivals such as Sundance, London BFI, Annecy, and Zagreb Animafest. In addition to her independent projects, she has been involved in commercial productions since 2023 and has collaborated remotely with Jelly, a London-based creative agency. She was also selected for a six-month art residency in Hiroshima in 2022 and for a three-month residency at La NEF/Annecy in France in 2025.

During her residency at the MQ, Mahboobeh Kalaee is developing the pre-production for her short film with the working title Real Life. The story combines live action and 2D animation and centers on a conflicted gay French researcher who travels to a mountain prison to help his lover. Instead of finding him, he encounters a strange mystic from the 10th century. During her stay, Mahboobeh is refining the script and dramaturgy and then plans to begin storyboarding.

In addition, she intends to develop ideas for a separate film about the Austrian painter and filmmaker Maria Lassnig. Mahboobeh is experimenting with footage of Maria Lassnig’s paintings and animation in order to expand and translate her visual approach — she is searching for ways to recreate both Lassnig’s and her own perspective through a hybrid language of live action and animation.