It is often surprising how art exhibitions seem to create a timely commentary to current events.
Throughout the month of September, we have seen demonstrations in Iran. The protests sparked after the death in custody of a 22-year-old Kurdish woman, Mahsa Amini, detained by the Gasht-e Ershad, the "morality police", for being in violation of the dress code for women.
Protests, focused on women's rights and against the hijab that the theocratic regime enforces as mandatory, spread to different cities in Iran, but found support all over the world. In many images and footage, we have seen women cutting off their hair, a symbol of mourning and protesting in Iranian literature.
During the protests there were other victims, including two 16-year-old girls, Nika Shakarami, whose mother states she was beaten to death by regime forces, and Sarina Esmailzadeh, who posted vlogs on YouTube and who was killed when security forces beat her with batons at a protest in Gohardasht.
The protest movement is the biggest challenge to the Iranian regime's authority in decades and is proving there is a younger generation of angry and brave young women fighting against restrictions on their daily lives.
There is an exhibition that opened last week at the Barbican Centre's The Curve, in London, that could help us learning more about Iranian indomitable women and their lives between 1925 and the 1979 revolution - "Soheila Sokhanvari: Rebel Rebel" (until 26th February 2023).
With a title inspired by David Bowie's 1974 eponymous song, the exhibition of the Iranian artist born in Shiraz and currently living and working in Cambridge, features 27 portraits of Iranian feminist icons.
When I was invited for this commission, I knew immediately how I wanted to respond: with a body of work that would transport visitors to the pulse of life in pre-revolutionary Iran and to the women at the heart of that culture," Soheila Sokhanvari stated in a press release.
The miniatures, painted in egg tempera onto calf vellum with a squirrel-hair brush, are hung against a hand-painted mural based on Islamic geometries decorating the 90-metre gallery, transformed for the occasion into a devotional space where the stories of these feminist icons can be contemplated.
Among the women portrayed there are Roohangiz Saminejad, the first Iranian unveiled actress to appear in a Persian language film; iconic actor and singer Googoosh (Faegheh Atashin) who popularised the miniskirt and a hairstyle called the Googooshy; the controversial modernist poet Forough Farrokhzad; the leading intellectual and writer Simin Dāneshvar; film stars Zari Khoshkam and Nosrat Partovi, and Masoumeh Azizi Borujerdi, better known as Mahvash, an Iranian singer, dancer, film actress and stage performer.
All the women shine in the portraits: the images may be taken from old black and white portraits, but in the paintings they are dressed in vibrantly coloured designs in Western styles, in environments with sofas, wallpaper or rugs covered in bold geometric patterns that wouldn't look out of place on a Prada runway.
Some of the women in the paintings have red varnished nails or hold cigarettes, they wear jewelry and have glamorous hairstyles that in some cases are reminiscent of Italian film star Gina Lollobrigida's. All these elements are in contrast with the strict codes introduced by the theocratic regime and also make us think about the pictures of the young students killed in the recent protests, pictured wearing the veil in the streets, and at home, in colourful tops and dyed hair.
While some of the women portrayed by Sokhanvari aligned with the rules introduced in 1979 (Khoshkam, for example, who carried on acting repenting her past ways and changing her name), most of them didn't and were therefore silenced and written out of history.
Film-maker Kobra Saeedi, who protested on International Women's Day 1979 against the introduction of compulsory hijab, was jailed and confined for years in mental institutions; film star Parvin Kheirbakhsh, known as Forouzan, was thrown in prison in 1979, had all her property taken away by the courts and died unknown and forgotten.
Visitors can discover more about the biographies of these female heroes in the printed gallery guide or by phone-scanning a QR code. The event culminates in mirrored sculptures featuring internal projections drawn from classic Iranian cinema.
"Rebel Rebel" is accompanied by a soundtrack by Marios Aristopoulos, featuring songs by celebrated Iranian singers from the mid-20th century, including Ramesh and Googoosh - a poignant gesture as women were banned from singing in 1979 and it remains illegal for a woman's voice to be broadcast in Iran.
"I hope that visitors will revel in the opportunity to learn about the lives of these formidable women, who gave up everything to pursue their creativity," states Sokhanvari about her exhibition.
While you will definitely learn more about these women through Sokhanvari's works, the best thing about them is that the paintings give their visibility back to women who were banned and literally erased from history. Expect some of these works to be featured in further exhibitions, who knows, maybe at the Fondazione Prada in Milan or integrated in a Prada show.
Image credits for this post
All images in this post © Soheila Sokhanvari. Courtesy of the artist and Kristin Hjellegjerde Gallery.
Let Us Believe in the Beginning of the Cold Season (Portrait of Forough Farrokhzad), 2022
Hey, Baby I'm a Star (Portrait of Fouzan), 2019
The Love Addict (Portrait of Googoosh), 2019
Wild at Heart (Portrait of Pouran Shapoori), 2019
Rhapsody of Innocence (Portrait of Monir Vakili), 2022
The Lor Girl (Portrait of Roohangiz Saminejad), 2022
Only the Sound Remains (Portrait of Ramesh), 2021
Rebel (Portrait of Zinat Moadab), 2021
Eve (Portrait of Katayoun (Amir Ebrahimi)), 2021
A Dream Deferred (Portrait of Haydeh Changizian), 2022
Tobeh (Portrait of Zari Khoshkam), 2020
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