Mohsen Makhmalbaf echoed the sentiment, saying Iran’s cinema owes its global reputation to his fellow director, but that this visibility did not translate into a greater visibility for his work in his homeland.
“Kiarostami gave the Iranian cinema the international credibility that it has today,” he told the Guardian. “But his films were unfortunately not seen as much in Iran. He changed the world’s cinema; he freshened it and humanised it in contrast with Hollywood’s rough version.”
From the The Guardian article linked to by djross. It doesn't provide much of an explanation other than corroborating what you just said, but it indeed is a pretty remarkable fact.
Close-Up (1990), Life and Nothing More... (1992), Through the Olive Trees (1994), A Taste of Cherry (1997), The Wind Will Carry Us (1999) Ten (2002) and Certified Copy (2010) are all crucial films to see. If possible, in chronological order.
I'll try to stick to this order, thanks.