Shirin Neshat

Shirin Neshat (b. 1957) has won renown for her photo and video works which visualize the conditions of women in Iran. Her works display strong contrasts, both in colouration and in how they poignantly portray the status of women. After studying in the USA, Neshat was prevented from returning to her home country because of the Islamic revolution. When finally allowed to visit Iran in 1990, she witnessed for the first time the radical changes that the transition from constitutional monarchy to rigid theocracy had brought. The religiously-imposed separation of the sexes and the changes in women’s conditions were what shocked her most profoundly. Neshat uses her two cultural backgrounds to discuss the ambivalent role that women in Iran and many other Islamic countries must adjust to.

The photograph Soraya (Zarin Series: Women without Men) (2005) presents a beautiful young girl in a flower-print dress. There is something disturbing about the relation between the girl’s direct gaze, red lipstick and childish dress. She seems simultaneously to radiate pride and a need for protection. Who is she and what is her story?

The picture’s title suggests a connection to the novel Women without Men by Shahrnush Parsipur (1989), about five women from Teheran and how their destinies are variously influenced by the extensive political changes of 1953. Iran’s democratically elected prime-minister was deposed, with the help of British and American forces, and the coup leaders reinstated Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi as ruler. Despite the Shah’s Western orientation, his rule was marked by political repression and torture.

Neshat has made numerous photographs and five movies about the fates of the women in Parsipur’s novel. The stories deal with sexuality and ignorance, anxiety, taboos and repression, but also resistance. They address how the control of female sexuality (partly by society and partly by men and other women), is a critical factor in the exercise of power. Zarin’s story is about a young traumatized prostitute who escapes from her bondage and degrading existence when the men she is with suddenly lose their facial features. This discovery propels her out into the city, in search of meaning and belonging, but no mater where she turns, the men are faceless.

The young girl in the picture is a character in Zarin’s world. In the film we see her arriving at the brothel and being introduced to its customs and practices. She represents the continuity of repression. Meanwhile, the picture of the isolated, deeply neurotic Zarin displays a new tendency in Neshat’s emotionally charged art; more than in her earlier works, individual destinies are now the starting point for examining the culture of Persian women. The young face with make-up also relates to other works in Rotations #2. Take for instance Mari Slaattelid’s series Protected (2000); Slaattelid’s white-painted faces have been interpreted as a comment on the history of modern painting, but they can also refer to how women through the ages have masked themselves for protection or 'conservation'. It is also worthwhile reflecting over Neshat’s work in relation to Cindy Sherman’s 'centrefold' and Lizzie Bougatsos’ advertisement model.

HBU