Abstract
Gender politics and women’s rights in the Islamic Republic of Iran are rooted in historical and sociological contexts in which patriarchy supports Islam and Islam supports patriarchy. The combination of Islam and patriarchal society, both significant parts of Iranian history, amplifies and reinforces women’s suppression. My artwork illuminates the plight of the Iranian women, censored by an overreaching patriarchy, and creates a place where they can exist freely, out of convention. The Persian carpet and tile patterns act as an essential bridge between different elements of my paintings and can often be read as a woman’s hair or her hijab or the space she is in – the design or the tradition being part of her, deeply imprinted and embedded. Influenced by the work of Alice Neel, Shirin Neshat, and Lalla Essaydi, I also reference Michel Foucault’s notion of heterotopic space. I combine drawing and painting to explore a nostalgia of distant intimacies in my life, transformed into figures in dreamscapes, and construct images that reveal and empower the complex realities of Iranian female identity. The versatility of heterotopic spaces allows me to construct an ideal world outside of convention – a special, secret space, which exists in stark contrast with Iranian reality. My paintings express my personal story, but they also reflect the lives of Iranians and suppressed women. I address the complexity of Iranian female identity in the imagined space that departs from reality and creates an extraordinary, supportive, heterotopic representation.