From an 8-Meter Studio to Art of Arm

 How years of building, migration and creative exploration eventually led me to create Art of Arm.

I've been fascinated by the world of 3D for as long as I can remember.

One of my earliest memories is receiving a copy of 3ds Max version 3 as a gift from my perspective drawing teacher during my university entrance exam classes. Long before that, I was already drawn to imagining and creating things in three dimensions.

My education eventually led me toward graphic design, but after graduating, I spent several years trying different paths and figuring out how I could find my way back to 3D design.

Sometimes life pushes us in directions that are different from our interests. We end up doing things out of necessity, and before we realize it, years can pass while we're far away from what we truly enjoy.

The Beginning

I was lucky.

In 2015, during a period when I felt quite lost, I discovered 3D printing. Suddenly, everything I had learned over the years about 3D modeling started to make sense.

Then things began to connect.

I discovered ZBrush and instantly fell in love with learning it. I had always enjoyed figurative drawing throughout high school and university, and for the first time, all these separate skills started coming together.

The 8-Meter Studio

That same year, I started my own business alone inside a small 8-square-meter studio in Tehran.

Everything started there.

The feeling of accomplishment that little room gave me is something I haven't experienced anywhere else. I used to spend 9 to 11 hours a day there, building, learning and experimenting.

Where it all began: My 8-square-meter studio back in Tehran (2015).

What started as a small 3D printing service eventually grew into Nikano.

Nikano will always be something I'm proud of. I built it from scratch, and even today, while living 13,000 kilometers away, it continues to run. For me, that will always be a personal achievement and a reminder that I was capable of building something real.

Bringing Creative Fabrication to Toronto (2022)

In 2022, I moved to Canada and eventually based my creative practice in Toronto.

I felt that I needed more space to grow, both professionally and personally. I thought moving abroad would give me that opportunity, although it quickly proved to be much more difficult than I had imagined.

It was here that I started asking myself a different question:

Why would I rebuild exactly the same life all over again?

Why should I repeat the same path and once again say yes to every project simply to support the heavy costs of running a business?

I had already lived that experience once.

Why I Didn't Want to Start Over

This time, I wanted to do things differently.

I wanted to build something that came from genuine curiosity and personal interest. I wanted money to become a result of the work, not the reason behind it.

For years, I postponed the idea of creating a personal platform because I never felt ready enough.

Eventually, I decided to stop waiting.

How Art of Arm Was Born

That's how Art of Arm was born. The name is connected to my own name, but it also carries a subtle reference to the art of making things by hand. I built this platform to focus on what I truly love: large-scale creative fabrication, contemporary sculpture design, and custom art projects here in Toronto.

This website is a space to share the projects I genuinely want to create, document my workshop experiences, talk about the tools I'm learning, and explore bold concepts. If, along the way, someone connects with my work and it creates new collaborations, that's simply a beautiful part of the journey. Behind this website are years of doubts, struggles, and hesitation. I'm happy that I finally gave myself permission to build something I truly wanted.

A Path, Not a Goal

Over the years, I've learned something important about myself.

Every time I achieve a goal, it eventually stops feeling like a destination because a new one quietly appears in its place.

That's why this website is no longer a goal.

It's a path.

A place where I build, learn, publish, connect with people and perhaps even build a life around the things I love creating.

Art of Arm isn't meant to be a destination.

It's meant to become a place where the next years of my creative and professional life will be documented.

And I think this is only the beginning.