Man With Giant Wheel Rolls Through Havre de Grace

HAVRE DE GRACE, MD — An artist who lives in Germany is rolling a giant wheel through the streets of Havre de Grace. Along the way he is filming his adventure.

Shahin Tivay Sadatolhosseini started his U.S. journey in New York and is walking to Washington, D.C.

It is not his first trek with a gym wheel carrying his belongings and camera.

From 2015 to 2017, he walked with the wheel from Germany to Iran, where he was born but left as a child with his mother due to the Iraq-Iran conflict. His wheel is a way of bridging distances, he said.

The project has “layers,” Sadatolhosseini told Havre de Grace Patch, which ran into him on Otsego Street on Wednesday morning.

“One is to be slowly,” he said. The name of his project is “Yavash Yavash,” which means slowly. He follows the wheel along the roadside, one step at a time.

“The wheel is one of the oldest and most important inventions of humankind, and the circle as its essence is the central element of my activities as an artist,” Sadatolhosseini writes on his website. “The circle symbolizes repeating cycles; not only night and day, or the cycle of seasons, both of which take on significant meaning in my travels, but also the meditative effect of recurring movements, and the concept of closing circles, bringing disparate points together.”

In Germany, Sadatolhosseini worked as a gymnast, artist, acrobat and choreographer, inspired by the gym wheel.

Since starting in New York, he has traveled west toward the sunset and made various stops to rest.

“Some friends see me and say, ‘You have to visit our wonderful town,’ and it is a wonderful town,” Sadatolhosseini said. “I’m very excited that I was here.” His stops allow him a chance “to see the small and beautiful,” he added.

He also wants to promote green energy.

Another “very important part is to make friendships” while walking with the wheel, Sadatolhosseini said. When he was in Iran, he said he was “very surprised how good the country is. The people and the government are different.”

Because he is in the United States on a visa, Sadatolhosseini said he will be returning to Europe in August. Until then, he plans to take his wheel to the White House.

Wherever he goes, the wheel serves as a conversation piece, bringing people into his path he otherwise would not meet.

Said Sadatolhosseini: “The universe planned this.”