Huda Smitshuijzen AbiFares

Iran Inside Out

Influence of Homeland and Diaspora on the Artistic Language of Contemporary Iranian Artists

[text from the official exhiition press released]

The exhibition features 35 artists living and working in Iran, some exhibiting abroad for the first time, alongside 21 others living in the Diaspora. The result is a multifarious portrait of 56 contemporary Iranian artists challenging the conventional perceptions of Iran and Iranian art.

In Iran Inside Out, 210 works comprising painting, sculpture, photography, video and installation come together, in a rare moment which allows visitors an intimate look into the people, both inside and outside a country that is more complex than images of veiled women, worn out calligraphy and what a handful of other emblematic images would suggest.

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//For more information and to see and purchase the exhibit catalog visit the museum official exhibition website at chelseaartmuseum.org/exhibits/2009/iraninsideout/index.html//

Curated by Sam Bardaouil and Till Fellrath, Iran Inside Out is an examination of the means through which a young generation of artists is reconciling the daily implications of cultural and geographical distances with the search for individual artistic expression. The exhibition, which puts focus on the new generation, offers an unexpected insight into the artistic energy of a culture that is constantly evolving as Iranians living both in and out of the country, come of age living and working in contentious societies. While half of these artists such as Vahid Sharifian, Barbad Golshiri, Farideh Lashai and Jinoos Taghizadeh reside in Iran, the other half including artists such as Shirin Neshat, Shahram Entekhabi, Mitra Tabrizian and Shoja Azari has been interspersed in the Diaspora.

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Iran Inside Out explores the process of deconstruction and reinvention of both, self and art that has resulted from this cultural schism, often swinging between openness and dialogue, or seclusion and separatism. Ironically, contrary to one's expectations, the artists living abroad often draw more on their cultural heritage, while those on the inside focus more on issues of everyday life without much regard to what the outside views as specifically Iranian references. Yet, within these disparities, one element stands strong: the recurrent references, sometimes ambiguous, at times emotional, often nostalgic and on occasion satirical and even tragic to Iran the country, Iran the past, the Iran which has been lost and that which could be found.

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The exhibiton will be traveling to the Farjam Collection/Hafiz Foundation in Dubai in March 2010. The exhibition is the second of three exhibitions under CAM's EastWest Project in 2009 which aims to promote and foster cross cultural dialogue.

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FEATURED ARTISTS:

Inside Iran (35)
Abbas Kowsari
Ahmad Morshedloo
Amir Mobed
Alireza Dayani
Arash Hanaei
Arash Sedaghatkish
Arman Stepanian
Barbad Golshiri
Behdad Lahooti
Behrang Samadzadegan
Bita Fayyazi
Daryoush Gharahzad
Farhad Moshiri
Farideh Lashai
Golnaz Fathi
Houman Mortazavi
Jinoos Taghizadeh
Khosrow Hassanzadeh
Mahmoud Bakhshi Moakher
Majid Maoomi Rad
Mehdi Farhadian
Nazgol Ansarinia
Newsha Tavakolian
Ramin Haerizadeh
Reza Derakshani
Reza Paydari
Rokni Haerizadeh
Sadegh Tirafkan
Saghar Daeeri
Shahab Fotouhi
Shirin Aliabadi
Shirin Fakhim
Siamak Filizadeh
Siavash Nagshbandi
Vahid Sharifian

(21) Outside Iran
Ala Ebtekar
Alireza Ghandchi
caraballo–farman
Darius Yektai
Kamran Diba
Leila Pazooki
Mitra Tabrizian
Nazanin Pouyandeh
Negar Ahkami
Nicky Nodjoumi
Parastou Forouhar
Pooneh Maghazehe
Pouran Jinchi
Roya Akhavan
Samira Abbassy
Sara Rahbar
Shahram Entekhabi
Shahram Karimi
Shirin Neshat
Shiva Ahmadi
Shoja Azari