Originally from a rice-growing region, Davood Koochaki began helping his family in the fields at the age of seven. At thirteen, he left his village for Tehran in hopes of a better life. There, he apprenticed as a mechanic, later opened his own workshop, and married that same year.
Father of four children, he began drawing in his forties as a pastime. After retirement, drawing became his main activity, encouraged by his son-in-law, a professional artist. Davood Koochaki would jokingly say: “I try to draw admirably, but this is what comes out. Perhaps it has something to do with my difficult past.”
Because he used only graphite and colored pencils, he was nicknamed “the Pencil Man.” His drawings reflect his fascination with primitive and hybrid figures — half-man, half woman — as well as fantastic animals and demigods, which he encloses within a kind of veil, like a net.