New Zealand photographer Amos Chapple has made three reporting trips to Iran since 2011. He visited areas that he described as "stupendously photogenic" but was more interested in uncovering unfamiliar facets of Iranian society. He said that every foreigner he met was taken aback to find that the real Iran differs greatly from the way it is depicted in the Western media. One of the greatest surprises for Chapple was that although the government continues to incite anti-Western sentiment, he felt nothing but goodwill from ordinary Iranians. (21 PHOTOS)
'Stupendously Photogenic' Iran
- By Amos Chapple
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A commemorative plate of the former Shah of Iran, overthrown in February 1979, in an antique store in Shiraz.
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A young man walks by stained glass windows at the Tehran Bazaar. More than half of all Iranians are under the age of 30. Although the regime of Ayatollah Khomeini encouraged Iranians to produce large families, young Iranians are now seen as the biggest threat to the conservative Islamic regime.
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Carvings in Persepolis, the seat of the ancient Persian empire
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People on the street in Mashhad, a city in the east of Iran, near the Afghan border. Eastern Iran is generally more conservative and Islamic than the West.
