Shirin Neshat’s extensive work has for decades focused on the problematic of the view of the female body and how women’s bodies continue to be a contested site of sin, shame, desire, oppression and politics, but also of rebellion, power and protest.
Shirin Neshat’s new exhibition The Fury at Fotografiska Stockholm consists of a video installation and a series of black and white photographs with poems by the Iranian poet Forough Farrokhzad, calligraphed by hand. By questioning and drawing attention to the relationship between the masculine and the feminine, the individual and the collective, the multidimensional works address issues of patriarchal power structures.
Based on magical realism
– I see everything in terms of dualities. Both visually and conceptually, I always look at opposites. Visually, my images are often black and white and based on magical realism, surrealism and dreams. Thematically, the stories are always politically charged and triggering but at the same time emotional, poetic and beautiful, says Shirin Neshat.
In a fictional and stylized way , Shirin Neshat’s new video installation tells about the exploitation of female political prisoners subjected to torture and sexual abuse, and how many of the women never recover from the trauma they have experienced in prison. The video depicts the psychological and emotional journey of a young Iranian woman who , despite now living freely in the United States, is still deeply traumatized by her memories of captivity .
The new series of still images focuses more directly on the female body as an object of both desire and violence. The nude portraits of various women convey a sense of beauty, dignity, confidence and pride, but also pain, vulnerability and trauma.
