ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on Iranian contemporary visual art, with an emphasis on female artists whose work challenges the received narrative of Iranian-ness and Iranian femininity. Shadi Ghadirian's photo collection, Like EveryDay, is a prime example of such attempts that aim to criticize, capitalize on, and, simultaneously, honor the limited role Iranian women play in the country's patriarchal cultural hegemony. I map out Ghadirian's acts of repair in relation to the country's evolving sociopolitical, economic, and cultural discourse, starting with the collapse of Pahlavi's regime and ending with the stalemate between Iran and Iraq after eight years of bloody war – a period that, as Ghadirian confesses herself, has left a bold mark on her art and ideology. Banned from displaying Like EveryDay in Iran, Ghadirian was pushed/invited to feature her collection in London. Such a complex interplay between getting banned inside and gaining visibility outside Iran brings with it the question and dilemma of belonging. I explain this dilemma by exploring the works of a younger generation of artists who came of age after the Iran–Iraq war, and who seek to make art more accessible to the public. Criticizing Ghadirian for her recent lack of consistency, Tahmineh Monzavi, a documentary photographer, and Hedieh Ahmadi, the chief organizer of the first-ever Art Book Fair in Tehran, Iran, offer a radically different approach to redefining Iranian-ness and the sense of belonging. These artists’ astute uses of social media, specifically Instagram, turn art into an open-source discourse capable of crossing enclosed Iranian borders and creating innovative ways of cultural exchange with their domestic and foreign viewers. This chapter aims to center the works of these three women whose different modes of documentation of the voices of the marginalized is – to borrow from Sara Ahmed – a feminist project. Shadi Ghadirian's projects document the lives of women after the Iran–Iraq war: private lives limited to the domestic spaces of their houses and away from society. Tahmineh Monsavi, on the other hand, steps outside into society to capture the lives of women in public spaces – places where we do not expect to see Iranian women, such as ruined cities, shelters, and addicts’ districts. Finally, the chapter ends with Hedieh Ahmadi, whose status cannot be compared with that of Ghadirian or Monzavi; however, her editorial role as the first organizer of the Art Book Fair in Iran provided a platform for many marginalized voices who would have struggled finding other outlets to showcase their works and talents inside and outside the country. The transition from private to public and to a crowdsourcing method of documentation of the voices of the marginalized becomes tangible only if the works of these three women are unpacked in one chapter and in tandem with each other.
