16 February - 11 March at New Hall
College, University of Cambridge
Thirty Years of Solitude
is an exhibition of photographs by Iranian women and a small selection of films
by Iranian women-Directors. Sixty photographs by thirty artists, some of whom
are internationally renowned and seven short films and long-features by the most
prominent Directors, attempt to reveal the feelings of anxiety, isolation and
the sense of loss that the Iranian society at large and women artists, in
particular have been experiencing in the last thirty years, living in
Iran. In order to capture this
existential feeling, the Diaspora is not included in this
exhibition.
Photography
is a particularly political art form, and in a country where the political is so
mingled with the religious, it has acquired a quasi-ontological dimension. For
instance the 8-year war with Iraq (1981-1989), which was a Jihad, where
thousands of children and teenagers ran to martyrdom, was not a favourite
subject of the media at the time, and few people outside of Iran realize how
devastating this war has been. Bani-Etemad's GILANEH is a new version of
MOTHER-COURAGE, epitomizing the ever self-sacrificing mother figure in Iranian
culture.
Iran is a grand
and vast country, full of contradictions and complexities and ambiguities. The
ambivalence of Persian poetry, especially Hafez, which speaks of and to, either
the beloved or God, in turn highly sensuous or all spiritual depending which way
the poem is read, is an everlasting form of expression in the arts, particularly
in photography which is but a reflection of the realities of daily
life.
The duality
Image/Reality, also omnipresent in Persian philosophy, now finds a fertile
ground for expression in photography: every image has many layers of different
meanings, as in Mehraneh Atashi's self-portraits where she is standing
bare-footed on photos of her childhood.
But the most
interesting aspect of photography by Iranian women is the sense of humor with
which the artists tackle the main problems they face in life, here and now:
Islamic paternalism, loss of identity, isolation from the rest of the world,
war...
Photography
Exhibition
Saturday 17 February to Sunday 11 March in the Long Room, New
Hall.
Daily 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Admission free.
Details: skg22@cam.ac.uk
Film
Programme
16-17 February and 23-24 February in Buckingham House Lecture
Theatre. All welcome; admission free on first come basis. No advance bookings.
Details ep208@cam.ac.uk
Friday 16 February at 8.15 p.m.:
introduced
by Goli Taraghi House is
Black (directed by
Forough Farrrokhzad) and Old Man of
Hara introduced by
director Mahvash Sheikholeslami
Saturday 17 February at 2.30 p.m.:
Bou
Bou in Tehran (directed by
Maryam Mehrjui) and Juste une
Femme (directed by
Mitra Farahani)
and at 7.30
p.m.:The
Day I Became a Woman (directed by
Marzieh Meshkini)
Friday 23 February at 8.15 p.m.:
introduced
by director Rakhshan Bani-Etemad Guilaneh
Saturday 24 February at 3.00 p.m.:
Friday Afternoon introduced by
director Mona Zandi-Haghighi
and at 7.30
p.m.:introduced by
director Niki Karimi A Few Days
Later
The
College is grateful for the support of Cambridge City Council, the Soudavar Fund
of the Faculty of Oriental Studies, University of Cambridge, and the British
Embassy, Tehran
See also CRASSH Film Seminar on
24 February
