Iranian Artists Bridge Cultures
Arlington Exhibit Has Counterpart in Tehran

By Tara Bahrampour
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, July 12, 2007

Diplomatic relations between the United States and Iran have remained frozen for nearly 30 years, but the ice is thawing a bit this summer in Arlington and Tehran with two exhibits of work by Iranian artists -- from inside and outside Iran -- seeking to bridge the divide.

Late last month, the Arlington exhibit, "Transform/Nation: Contemporary Art of Iran and Its Diaspora," opened at the Ellipse Arts Center. About 400 people squeezed in to view paintings, videos and painted cushions and exchange insights on a country most Americans don't typically associate with contemporary art.

"We wanted to give people a different alternative than what is represented in the media," said Nikoo Paydar, co-curator of the exhibit and one of the founders of Iranian Alliances Across Borders, which co-sponsored the exhibit. Planet Arlington, a county organization that raises awareness about immigration, globalization and the environment through arts and humanities programs, is the other sponsor.

"We felt like there was a real need for different visual representations of Iran and Iranians," said Paydar, a Washington resident.

Describing most Americans' images of Iran as involving "anger" and "a lot of black," she said, "We wanted to give a more diverse and complex view of Iranians and how they choose to represent and identify themselves."

It wasn't hard to find artists who shared that view. A call for submissions elicited more than 150 responses from artists in North America, Iran, Europe and Australia, many of whom came of age after the 1979 revolution that transformed Iran into an Islamic theocracy.

Fourteen artists were selected for the Arlington exhibit, and 12 for Tehran. Four of the artists attended the Arlington reception; two missed it because their visas to travel from Iran did not come through in time.

Artists were not the only ones who had a hard time traveling. In a few cases, the art did, too. Some artists hand-carried their work through customs; despite trade sanctions, U.S. customs allows entry of contemporary art from Iran, said Narges Bajoghli, co-curator of the exhibit and the other founder of Iranian Alliances Across Borders.

But California artist Amir Esfahani worried that his 3-by-3-foot painting would not make it to Tehran if sent by conventional method. So he cut it up and mailed each piece in a separate envelope.

"If not all the pieces get there, that's okay," Paydar said, because Esfahani wants to "document the whole process, that this is how difficult it is to get my artwork to Iran."

Several of those pieces were still in transit when the Tehran exhibit opened last Thursday, organizers said. About 100 people attended.

Bajoghli, a Springfield resident, said she was surprised at the boldness of some of the art destined for the Tehran show, which included a video installation showing murals exhorting women to cover themselves.

The curator of that show reassured Bajoghli that political themes were okay. "She was like, 'Don't worry about that . . . as long as there's not any nudity.' "

Although the Arlington opening drew many local Iranians, it also attracted many attendees with no ties to Iran.

"A great number of people found it interesting and found the arts a great way to explore this topic," said Jim Byers, marketing director for the Arlington County Cultural Affairs Division, which supports the area's arts community. "You really do feel like you're communicating with the people instead of just facts and figures. You're really communicating feelings and emotions."

Watching "Tehran Reflections," a video by Germany-based artist Kaya Behkalam, some recent arrivals from Tehran sighed with nostalgia as they recognized certain streets. Other attendees said the scenes of traffic, tall buildings and glossy shop fronts surprised them.

"The video is actually from Tehran, and I've never seen it," said Tina Safaie, 15, a student of Iranian descent at Fairfax County's James Madison High School. "It's more modernized than I thought it would be."

Many of the artworks combine Eastern and Western imagery, such as Los Angeles-based Samira Yamin's scenes of war in Iraq, Afghanistan and the Palestinian territories, printed on designer scarves.

"This was made in the West, but the design, the patterns, they're drawn from the Middle East but intended for Western consumerism," Yamin said, pointing to a painted Christian Dior scarf with paisley-patterned edges. Printing images of tanks on the scarf presents another layer of duality, said Yamin, who grew up in California.

Bahram Khozai, an Alexandria resident who has lived in the United States for 42 years, applauded the young artists, some of whom did not grow up in Iran. "These guys are making us proud," he said.

Khozai said he could tell which works were made by people living in Iran. "They are very sensitive about the hair," he said, pointing to a self-portrait by Iran-based Samineh Sarvghad, showing her face (and hair) cut off by the top edge of the canvas. "People here don't have that inhibition."

By all accounts, the Tehran art scene is thriving. "It's huge, it's vibrant," said Bani Khoshnoudi, creator of a video installation called "Tehran Portraits."

Khoshnoudi said that she knows of 150 to 200 galleries in Tehran, as well as several private and underground galleries, and that many of them are surprisingly free in what they exhibit.

"They're beyond this thing where we ask ourselves, 'Is it okay to be showing this?' " she said, adding that art in Tehran, as elsewhere, is a form of resistance. "It's a way of life . . .they're not living through foreign recognition; there's something happening there."

Khoshnoudi, who lives in Paris, designed her video around the themes of progress, freedom, information and movement. Standing beside a monitor showing a scene from a Tehran construction site, she explains that the themes are "about me and putting myself into question. Freedom, progress, information, movement -- how much of those do I actually have as an Iranian who has grown up abroad?"

Yamin said she plans to try to answer that question for herself by moving to Iran in the fall. "I haven't seen any fine arts graduate programs that I like, so in my mind, it's like going to grad school," she said, adding that her aunt is an artist there. "I'd love to be able to travel, to see the desert, to make some art.

"Everyone always asks me, 'Given the current political state, can an artist work freely?' " she said. "And the answer is, yeah."

The Arlington exhibit runs through Aug. 4, with a classical Persian concert from noon to 1 p.m. today and a panel discussion, "The Power of a Cliche," from 7 to 9 p.m. next Thursday. Panelists include Maymanah Farhat, ArteNews editor; Leyla Pope, "Transform/Nation" co-curator; and Haleh Anvari, a featured artist. The Ellipse Arts Center is at 4350 N. Fairfax Dr., Arlington. For more information, call 703-228-7710.