Iranian Artists at the Queens Museum (II)

A couple of weeks ago, we gave you the heads-up on artist Sara Rahbar who was part of the Queens Museum’s International exhibit which closed this Sunday. Visiting on the exhibit’s last day, I was surprised to find two other Iranian artists featured. Above is a debris-strewn room with Iranian items covered in dust: Persian rugs on the floor, a book of Forough Farrokhzad poems (this room was put together by Rahbar in collaboration with an Afghan women’s group in Queens). On one of the walls of this room was a projection of the Neda Sarmast documentary about Iranian youth, Nobody’s Enemy. It was very chilling to sit in this space that clearly acted as a model of a bombed home, especially while watching a film that included many people who might be critically and personally affected by a seemingly imminent Iran-America conflict brewing at the moment. Not many people stepped into the room – I suppose walking on dirt isn’t so appealing. But for those that did it was surely an immersive experience, as evidenced by the hushed tones they took on upon entry, as though they were at a funeral.

I was immediately drawn to Anahita Vossoughi’s painting, “The Touching Implication of You” (pictured). The artist was born in Canada and now lives in New York, and her work explores sexuality and sexual ambiguities really effectively. I love the androgyny in this painting; it reminded me of the work of Harvard professor Afsaneh Najmabadi in Women with Mustaches and Men Without Beards, which is all about how Western ideals of gender shaped Iranian ones. I wonder if an argument could be made here that perhaps Vossoughi’s art is an echo of pre-colonial Iran’s sexual culture? An interesting idea, in any case.