Shirin Neshat

Shirin Neshat was born in 1957 in Qazvin, Iran, where she grew up in a privileged family immersed in the more Westernized version of Islam. In 1974, she left her homeland to study in the United States. After the Islamic Revolution, she decided to remain abroad, returning to Iran for the first time only in 1990. This visit profoundly affected her, leading her to choose voluntary exile—her last visit to Iran being in 1996. Since then, she has lived and worked between California and New York, exhibiting her art around the world for over 20 years.

In an account collected by art critic RoseLee Goldberg, the beginnings of Neshat's artistic career are revealed: "She buys real guns and rifles, puts them in a plastic bag, and takes them home, as if nothing, riding the subway. Then, she invites a photographer friend to her loft, who already collaborates with other artists and performers, and has herself photographed, veiled from head to toe in a black chador: the barrel of a gun resting against her face like an earring, a rifle placed between her bare feet—a subtle yet blatant violation of Islamic law, which forbids any form of nudity."

Neshat describes her artistic approach as: "an expression of reality, not so much in the objects I create as an artist, but because I feel embedded in the reality of things and their occurrences. For this reason, I strive to move beyond traditional art forms like sculpture and painting to explore multimedia languages, which have a more engaging power."

Her entire body of work is rooted in continuous references to her own culture, creating new representations of the female body against the Islamic culture that has historically denied it. In the office of collector Giuseppe Iannaccone, one of her photographic works, Speechless (1996), is displayed, taken from the series Women of Allah (1993-1997). The images from this early series are based on poetry, which also serves as the final seal of the artwork. These early photographic works began as a kind of private performance, guided by the verses of a poem that inspired Neshat in her choices of lighting, costumes, and props. Once the photograph was developed, that same poem would be handwritten by Neshat in Persian script, with pen and ink, directly onto the photograph's surface. The Farsi calligraphy intertwines with the image, becoming the "voice of the photo, breaking the silence of the woman portrayed."

In 1999, Neshat won the Golden Lion at the Venice Biennale, and in 2009, with her first feature film Women Without Men, she won the Silver Lion for Best Director at the 66th Venice Film Festival.