Mani Pournaghi Azar is a European cultural manager working internationally. Since October 2021 he is the head of the Goethe-Institut Istanbul/Turkey. Before, he was the director of the strategy and evaluation department at the Goethe-Institut’s headquarter in Germany. Before moving to Munich in 2019 he was leading for more than three years the Goethe-Institut in Beirut/Lebanon. He previously worked from 2011 to 2015 as head of the EU Liaison Office at the Goethe-Institut in Brussels/Belgium and was from 2005 to 2011 program manager for the transatlantic organization Villa Aurora, based in Berlin and Los Angeles.
He holds a Master’s degree in European Media Studies of the University of Potsdam and a Bachelor’s degree in Culture and Management. Mani Pournaghi Azar was a scholar of the German Academic Scholarship Foundation and fellow at the think tank “stiftung neue verantwortung”.
In his professional life, he is passionate about international cultural relations, committed to the management of strategic organizational developments and change processes. His research interest is a dialogue oriented multilateralism and good governance for non-profit organizations.