DOI Artikel:
Inglot, Joanna: Trans-cultural dialogues in the art of Iranian Diaspora: Shirin Neshat and Parastou Forouhar
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.34225#0083
TRANS-CULTURAL DIALOGUES IN THE ART OF IRANIAN DIASPORA...
77
redefined national and retigious identity^. Shirin Neshat evokes this iayered and poiiticaHy potent symboiism
of the veii in o/A/////?, whiie at the same time setting up a dichotomy with Western discourse.
The image of a Musłim woman in diverse body coverings, such as the chador, burqa, dupatta, hijab, or
niqab, popularły rełerred to as the "veif" has have been the most visible marker of difference between Isłam
and the West at łeast from the Enhghtenment. However, the fantasies of mysterious, erotic, submissive, and
ahuring veited Mushm women buiit up during the nineteenth century (perhaps best seen in the paintings of
North Affica and Arabia by Jean-Léon Gérôme, Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres, and Eugène Delacroix) have
become the deflning łeitmotifs of Orientahst discourseT Since the 1960s, these romanticized visions have
increasingły given way to more disturbing associations with pohtical vioience and terrorism. The first visual
reference to veiled women and terrorism appeared in Giho Pontecorvo's fihn №6 7?<т?7/е q/A/g/Тгл (1966). This
connection was magnified by media during the Iranian Revolution, the American hostage crisis (1979-1981),
and the Iran-Iraq war, when photographs of masses of revolutionary Iranian women in chadors carrying guns
were featured in the magazines and on television, as well as in Iran as propaganda'T Shirin Neshat condenses
and overlays all of these referents and narratives in her Ub777e77 q/Н//я/7 series, in which the veiled woman
appears simultaneously as an emblem of oppression, liberation, Orientalist fantasy, and potential danger.
At least half of the photographs in the series depict women bearing guns, soinetimes provocatively
pointed at the viewer. In 7?с/)е///ош 07/<?77ce (1994) (Fig. 1), for instance, the camera captures an alert and
assertive veiled wornan confidently holding a rifle and boldly retuming the gaze of her viewer. The triangular
shape of her body, covered in black chador and set against a minimal white background, reinforces her
physical presence and magnifies her power. Standing still, she at once resembles a committed guardian
of the revolution while at the same time appearing remarkably static and emotionally withdrawn. Such
presentation and the stark contrast between black and white underscores the perceived Westem dualities
of Muslim threat and violence contrasted with Orientalized female passivity.
In other images the placement of guns appears more benign, almost playful. A//eg7(377c<? wif/? ЛТАе/м//?^
(1994) (Fig. 2), for example, features a metal rifle barrel protruding almost like a toy from between the
woman's tiny bare feet with Farsi inscriptions, while in ôy/eec/z/avs' (1996) (Fig. 3), the gun is placed
decoratively next to the woman's face, like an earring making her look alluring. In other photographs in
the series, the women appear vulnerable, introspective, sensual, and at times matemal (Fig. 4)". As art
historians Iftikar Dadi, Susan Babaie, and Mitra Abbaspour have pointed out, instead of rejecting Western
stereotypes, Neshat deliberately enacts them to reveal connections among violence, politics, and spirituality
in Islamic practice and to disclose dualistic position of Iranian Muslim woinen, who while subservient
to men in many public areas become powerful force in revolution and war'T Simultaneously, however,
she undermines the Westem cliché of the Muslim woman as a passive and submissive victim of her own
culture. Dressed in traditional chadors but at the same time wearing heavy eye makeup and unabashedly
gazing at the viewer (both practices at that time prohibited by Islamic law), Neshat's women clearly reject
and transgress the cultural constructs available to them as modern Muslim women and exist on the border
between modernity and tradition and between their "subjugated" and "liberated" positions'T
Neshat builds many conceptual tensions and cultural collisions into her photographs. One of the most
important emerges from her technique of inscribing Persian texts on the women's uncovered body parts-eyes,
faces, hands, and feet. Borrowing verses from modem Iranian women writers, especially celebrated feminist
poets Fomgh Farrokhzad (1935-1967) and Tahereh Saffhrzadeh (1936-2008)'^, she employs these texts as
s M. Moallem. ReTwee/? 1%77т;'ог оят/ ХАУел' Ыа?77<с им7!(Уо7770777о/м777 <377<У 7/?о Ро/;'//с^ q7Po/T'/oT'cAv /77 /7-077,
Berkeley: University of Califomia Press, 2005, Chapter 3 analyzes these political shifts during the revolution in detaii.
° M. Yegenoglu, C0/077/0/ Со77/о^№.' 7owo7-(/y o /Y777/77/.S'/ //go<y/77g o/07*/с77/о/;Т77!, New York: Cambridge University Press,
1998. p. 39.
I. Dadi, "Shirin Neshat's Photographs as Postcolonial Allegories," 5/77gs-, Voh 34. N0. 1 (Autumn 2008). p. 126.
ч M. Ho, "A State of In-between: Shirin Neshat's IranA in M. Chiu and M. Ho (ed.), YA/7-/77 №s*/7oL Uoc/77g ///у/от-у (exh cat.),
Washington D.C.: Hirshom Museum and Sculpture Garden, Smithsonian Institution, 2015, 17.
See for instance: I. Dadi, "Shirin Neshat's Photographs as Postcolonia) AHegories," Y/77g^.' Уомт-т7а/ о/1%7?7<?77 /77 См//мт-с
о?7<У S'oc/e/y, 34, I, 2008, р. 129; R.R. Hart, S. Babaie, and N. Princethal, 577/7-/77 №у/?о/, Detroit: Detroit Institute of Arts, 2013;
M.M. Abbaspour, 7т-07?Л-77а/;'07;а/, См//М7'о/, (777</ Со?р07-со/ /grOCg-S-.' /77g 7g7-7-//OT1^ o/ //?g /?0<Ą 777 //?g Hr/U'OT-/* qÔ 57777-/77 №^/70/ 0/7<У
Л/о77<э //а/ом777, МА thesis, University of Califomia, Riverside, 2001.
//77<yg777.
Staci Gem Scheiwiller, "In the House of Fatemeh: Revisiting Shirin Neshat's Photographic Series IIL<777g77 q/HZ/a/?," in
Staci Gem Scheiwiller (ed.) Pg/yb/wh^g //7g /7-077/077 5/o/g. НТмо/ См//мт*о о?7<У /?с/77-су^77/о//о77^ qô/7*077/077 /<Уо77/;'/у, London: Anthem
77
redefined national and retigious identity^. Shirin Neshat evokes this iayered and poiiticaHy potent symboiism
of the veii in o/A/////?, whiie at the same time setting up a dichotomy with Western discourse.
The image of a Musłim woman in diverse body coverings, such as the chador, burqa, dupatta, hijab, or
niqab, popularły rełerred to as the "veif" has have been the most visible marker of difference between Isłam
and the West at łeast from the Enhghtenment. However, the fantasies of mysterious, erotic, submissive, and
ahuring veited Mushm women buiit up during the nineteenth century (perhaps best seen in the paintings of
North Affica and Arabia by Jean-Léon Gérôme, Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres, and Eugène Delacroix) have
become the deflning łeitmotifs of Orientahst discourseT Since the 1960s, these romanticized visions have
increasingły given way to more disturbing associations with pohtical vioience and terrorism. The first visual
reference to veiled women and terrorism appeared in Giho Pontecorvo's fihn №6 7?<т?7/е q/A/g/Тгл (1966). This
connection was magnified by media during the Iranian Revolution, the American hostage crisis (1979-1981),
and the Iran-Iraq war, when photographs of masses of revolutionary Iranian women in chadors carrying guns
were featured in the magazines and on television, as well as in Iran as propaganda'T Shirin Neshat condenses
and overlays all of these referents and narratives in her Ub777e77 q/Н//я/7 series, in which the veiled woman
appears simultaneously as an emblem of oppression, liberation, Orientalist fantasy, and potential danger.
At least half of the photographs in the series depict women bearing guns, soinetimes provocatively
pointed at the viewer. In 7?с/)е///ош 07/<?77ce (1994) (Fig. 1), for instance, the camera captures an alert and
assertive veiled wornan confidently holding a rifle and boldly retuming the gaze of her viewer. The triangular
shape of her body, covered in black chador and set against a minimal white background, reinforces her
physical presence and magnifies her power. Standing still, she at once resembles a committed guardian
of the revolution while at the same time appearing remarkably static and emotionally withdrawn. Such
presentation and the stark contrast between black and white underscores the perceived Westem dualities
of Muslim threat and violence contrasted with Orientalized female passivity.
In other images the placement of guns appears more benign, almost playful. A//eg7(377c<? wif/? ЛТАе/м//?^
(1994) (Fig. 2), for example, features a metal rifle barrel protruding almost like a toy from between the
woman's tiny bare feet with Farsi inscriptions, while in ôy/eec/z/avs' (1996) (Fig. 3), the gun is placed
decoratively next to the woman's face, like an earring making her look alluring. In other photographs in
the series, the women appear vulnerable, introspective, sensual, and at times matemal (Fig. 4)". As art
historians Iftikar Dadi, Susan Babaie, and Mitra Abbaspour have pointed out, instead of rejecting Western
stereotypes, Neshat deliberately enacts them to reveal connections among violence, politics, and spirituality
in Islamic practice and to disclose dualistic position of Iranian Muslim woinen, who while subservient
to men in many public areas become powerful force in revolution and war'T Simultaneously, however,
she undermines the Westem cliché of the Muslim woman as a passive and submissive victim of her own
culture. Dressed in traditional chadors but at the same time wearing heavy eye makeup and unabashedly
gazing at the viewer (both practices at that time prohibited by Islamic law), Neshat's women clearly reject
and transgress the cultural constructs available to them as modern Muslim women and exist on the border
between modernity and tradition and between their "subjugated" and "liberated" positions'T
Neshat builds many conceptual tensions and cultural collisions into her photographs. One of the most
important emerges from her technique of inscribing Persian texts on the women's uncovered body parts-eyes,
faces, hands, and feet. Borrowing verses from modem Iranian women writers, especially celebrated feminist
poets Fomgh Farrokhzad (1935-1967) and Tahereh Saffhrzadeh (1936-2008)'^, she employs these texts as
s M. Moallem. ReTwee/? 1%77т;'ог оят/ ХАУел' Ыа?77<с им7!(Уо7770777о/м777 <377<У 7/?о Ро/;'//с^ q7Po/T'/oT'cAv /77 /7-077,
Berkeley: University of Califomia Press, 2005, Chapter 3 analyzes these political shifts during the revolution in detaii.
° M. Yegenoglu, C0/077/0/ Со77/о^№.' 7owo7-(/y o /Y777/77/.S'/ //go<y/77g o/07*/с77/о/;Т77!, New York: Cambridge University Press,
1998. p. 39.
I. Dadi, "Shirin Neshat's Photographs as Postcolonial Allegories," 5/77gs-, Voh 34. N0. 1 (Autumn 2008). p. 126.
ч M. Ho, "A State of In-between: Shirin Neshat's IranA in M. Chiu and M. Ho (ed.), YA/7-/77 №s*/7oL Uoc/77g ///у/от-у (exh cat.),
Washington D.C.: Hirshom Museum and Sculpture Garden, Smithsonian Institution, 2015, 17.
See for instance: I. Dadi, "Shirin Neshat's Photographs as Postcolonia) AHegories," Y/77g^.' Уомт-т7а/ о/1%7?7<?77 /77 См//мт-с
о?7<У S'oc/e/y, 34, I, 2008, р. 129; R.R. Hart, S. Babaie, and N. Princethal, 577/7-/77 №у/?о/, Detroit: Detroit Institute of Arts, 2013;
M.M. Abbaspour, 7т-07?Л-77а/;'07;а/, См//М7'о/, (777</ Со?р07-со/ /grOCg-S-.' /77g 7g7-7-//OT1^ o/ //?g /?0<Ą 777 //?g Hr/U'OT-/* qÔ 57777-/77 №^/70/ 0/7<У
Л/о77<э //а/ом777, МА thesis, University of Califomia, Riverside, 2001.
//77<yg777.
Staci Gem Scheiwiller, "In the House of Fatemeh: Revisiting Shirin Neshat's Photographic Series IIL<777g77 q/HZ/a/?," in
Staci Gem Scheiwiller (ed.) Pg/yb/wh^g //7g /7-077/077 5/o/g. НТмо/ См//мт*о о?7<У /?с/77-су^77/о//о77^ qô/7*077/077 /<Уо77/;'/у, London: Anthem