A Women-Led Revolution was ignited in Iran on September 16, 2022, following the killing of Mahsa Amini, 22, at the hands of the Morality police in Tehran for not wearing her hijab properly. People began protesting by the thousands all over Iran, a movement that persists despite over 20,000 young women and men facing imprisonment under severe conditions of torture and rape. However, resistance continues throughout Iran for regime change and the establishment of democracy and equality. Over 1000 people have been killed since September 2022.

KhodaNoor, a 27-year-old man from the Baloochstan region in Iran, who loved dancing, had his life cut short by torture and death at the hands of Iran's brutal regime. His story of suffering was so grave that people around the world reacted to the cruel way his hands were tied to a post in the middle of a square during intense heat for over 24 hours. A cup of water was placed a foot away from him for unimaginable physical and psychological torture.

Iranian Americans in the DC area are very active in protesting the criminal regime and standing in solidarity with the movement in Iran. During the one-week Sit-in on the US Capitol grounds in protest, my performance was conducted in memory of KhodaNoor, aiming to honor him and raise awareness about the Women, Life, Freedom Movement in Iran. Despite its simple setup on the grass on a cold November night, this performance was powerful, leading both men and women to tears throughout its 45-minute duration. Barefoot, with hands tied to a post by a rope, sitting on the grass in the same position as KhodaNoor, and adorned with bloody clothes (wet red paint), I remained motionless and silent, commemorating KhodaNoor and the 67 young people killed that day for peaceful protest.

Fahimeh Vahdat’s exhibition, Take Your Power Back, recently on view at The Rouse Gallery at Howard Community College in Columbia, MD, is a masterful and complex exploration of two opposing forces; those of the Victim and the Hero (please see the video of these 20 heroes/revolutionary women of USA and Iran under the extended portfolio). 
First, we will explore the Victim of physical violence.  As described by the artist, the flesh wound goes through four stages, but changes its color eight times during the entire healing process. These colors start with the very bright red color of fresh blood, to a darker, deeper and cloudy red of the scab. As healing continues, bruises develop, having colors that range from blue, blue- purple, purple, green- blue, brownish with yellow patches, and finally yellowish. When the wound completely heals, it may have a deep amber, and whitish scar for a while, depending on the color of the skin.

Vahdat represents these colors of violence through a series of works, each created with mixed media- an amazingly complex, yet very subtly intertwined mix of collage, sewing, embroidery, pigment, charcoal, glue, lace and fabric, on hand dyed canvas. These large veiled works take time to see and more time to fully internalize. While each is very different, they are tied together by large veils of translucent red, purple, greenish, and yellow fabric. Behind the fabric we begin to see beautifully drawn figures, those that have withstood attack and abuse. One of the many things that strikes me, while looking at the work, is how perfectly the drawings of figures are combined with the fabric, and how naturally, even quietly, these troubled figures seem to exist. They remind me of ghosts. And here I must bring in the reference to Gustav Klimt because they remind me of his work- or rather, I can see the ghosts of his work in Vahdat’s.  While Klimt used heavily patterned spaces and beautifully drawn female figures, Vahdat uses softer, gauzier patterning, and figures (often maternal figures and sometimes children) that appear translucent- more an integrated part of the space.

As one walks through the exhibition, towards the back of the gallery, a room has been constructed. This room is covered in fabric and rugs and feels very soft and inviting. There is a chair where the viewer can sit and a device with which you are requested to anonymously record an act of violence or abuse you have endured. Vahdat intends to use the information within these recordings for her next project. Within the room is also a very compelling image of a young vulnerable girl, standing beside a maternal, protective figure, titled My Mother and I. This adds to the feeling of safety Vahdat wants to convey in this Safe Room.
A particularly ominous aspect of this installation is that while you at first feel very safe in the room, you soon realize that the there is a large dark, shadowy figure, just outside of the door, peering in. This dark figure is part of another mixed media work, but the positioning of it, in relation to the door of the installation, has a very intimidating feeling.

In summary, Fahimeh Vahdat’s Take Your Power Back, is an exhibition full of depth, meaning, and beauty. Her works unfolds slowly in time, displaying a true level of mastery and integrity in the process. She is particularly adept at mixing materials that a less skilled artist could never pull off. That said, the content of the work takes center stage, and this content is certainly worth experiencing.
Art Review by Greg McLemore, art writer & artist, Baltimore, MD.
 

 Protest art especially live performance act as a poignant tool to form social consciousness for positive change in public places. In this performance cutting my long hair that was my identity for the past 43 years since I have left Iran was an act of defiance against brutality of Iran regime which has inflicted gross sufferings on Iranian people since 1979. The women-let revolution in the making is the first movement in the world that has ignited by the Iranian women is going strong. On September 16, 2022, after the killing of Mahsa Amini, 22 at the hands of Morality police in Tehran for not wearing her hijab properly. Women started protesting on streets all over cities and towns by burning their hijabs and cutting their hairs off against tyrannical gender-based apartheid regime for 43 years. On September 28, 2022, in front of my artwork entitled: Get your power Back, from Mona, 17 to Mahsa, 22 and the audience at the Fredrick Layton gallery located at MIAD, Milwaukee, I cut my hair to join in solidarity and to protest the brutality of the regime against its own people in Iran especially women and girls. The Women-Led Revolution and their quest for freedom, equality and democracy continues which now has given power to the women in Afghanistan to fight for their rights against Taliban regime. The performance was very emotional and moving for both the audience and me.

This multimedia memorial tribute installation is comprised of a wooden edifice (12'X10'X8'), 215 wooden memorial grave markers which each digitally manipulated, and hand printed on an etching press, a video looping the film: Angle of Iran, looping chanting music in the gallery, 215 white roses, candle and rose water, the act of one removing their shoes entering the edifice and a Persian rug. It is a memorial tribute to the 215 people who were executed in Iran after the revolution of 1979 solely for their beliefs in Baha'i faith.This piece has a center edifice that shrines the images of 10 young women who were hanged in Shiraz, Iran publicly on June 18, 1983. One of them was my second cousin Tahireh, 32. In this installation I have used digitized printing method using etching press on Chiri paper mounted on varnished wood for keeping them archival. Chanting music, Rose water, removing one's shoes entering the edifice, a Persian rug in the center of it and 215 white roses laid down across the edges of the exhibition space was intended to create a sacred space for those innocent women, men, young and old who lost their lives for their faith. My uncle Mr. Vahdat who was 80 years old was executed and his wife was given 100 slashes that made her paralyzed for the rest of her life. The atrocities against Baha'is in Iran have continued to this day. The UN resolution has recently called for Government of Iran change its policies toward systematic imprisonment and continuous civil and personal abuses against the Baha'is who are the largest religious minorities in Iran. This body of work which was extensively researched to collect accurate documents and photographs started in 1992 and was completed in 1995 received partial support from Andy Warhol Foundation and NEA regional grants. It has been exhibited in Dallas, Milwaukee, and West Virginia. The act of laying down white roses each time this installation has been exhibited is a heartbreaking reminder that those 215 people were denied of any given memorial by their families. 

A performance in response to my Censored work entitled: A Prison Called Iran.
From the "Freedom" series: A Prison called Iran” is the title of my work at this exhibition; it has been turned to the wall due to its content.  This mixed media ten feet tall painting on hand-dyed canvas, metaphorically, represents a contour drawing of a standing nude woman with supplicating hands in a prison cell in Iran while flower motifs on her feet symbolizes hope and freedom. This piece represents the women who are in prison cells in Iran, as prisoners of conscience, whose voices are not heard by the outside world.  At the same time, my voice as an artist is also not being heard due to censorship here in Milwaukee, WI. On June 16th, when I physically turned this piece to face the wall, I was overwhelmed with emotions and felt that I literally became the woman in a prison cell in Iran who faces walls all around her every day without the outside world hearing her voice.

A site specific and interactive mixed media installation at the Milwaukee Art Museum entitled: I am Iran I am America. This is the only art piece that I have made that symbolically deals with my journey from Iran to America 43 years ago, but this installation also dealt with the political relationship between USA and Iran and the continuation of executions of prisoners of conscious. 

I was forced to leave Iran after its revolution of 1979 due to persecution of Baha’is and execution of three of my relatives. Since then, I have lived in Europe and then USA in exile. As an Iranian American artist, Women / human rights activist, and educator I have worked on various capacities to share my experience with other artists and the communities in which I live in. The 8'X8' round table is divided into two uneven halves representing my life living in USA for the past 43 years. Also, Iran is a much smaller country than USA, a superpower, but with continued divide and conflict between the two countries at least on the surface. The tyrannic regime lobbies with the West and in the region by faking the condition of people living in Iran especially women and girls in order to hold its power in the region and to do business with the West. The nuclear deal has come along five years after I completed this piece, but my view on the brutal regime of Iran has not changed. I opposed Iran to have nuclear power but also USA not to have any business deal behind peoples back.
This mixed media installation compromises of fabricated wood with almost invisible screen printing on the top surface of each section using the word Iran and America in Persian writing representing secret deals. The layers of fabric also are printed with the same text in the missing color of each country's flag. No negotiation, no sitting down for discussion around this divided and uneven round table.

The smaller three tired, red, and blue egg tempera painting represents my feet for taking the journey, which took 556 days to set foot to US soil. It also represents the execution of prisoners of conscience by hanging practices that takes place often and mostly in public places in various cities and towns in Iran.

This 15'X7', two-sided (it was made to walk around the piece), hand dyed canvas with many layers of sheer fabrics and monotype prints of notable imprisoned women is a testimonial piece for resistance against tyrannical civil laws imposed on women in Iran since 1979.  Living in exile in the free world, my work focuses on human rights abuses, violence against women and girls and the prison systems especially in Iran and the Middle East. I often compare the violence against women and girls within the USA and how it differs. It is ironic as we have entered the age of technological advances on many levels as humans, we still witness human rights violation and lack of freedom and democracy in its pandemic state in many countries around the world. Does violence against women and girls goes under rug by the notion of culture stamped by the West in many countries around the world such as Afghanistan and Iran?

For example, in the body of work entitled: “Protest"; from my ongoing “Freedom” series, I examine the notion of peaceful protest especially since 2009 and its effect to bring positive changes around the world. Of course, we must note the historic 1963 March on Washington, and the “I have a Dream” peaceful protest led by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and how it has changed the courses of the history of a nation, but also, positively the lives of millions of people.

Since 2006 many courageous women in Iran have launched a “One Million-Signature Campaign” demanding changes to discriminatory civil laws against women's rights in Iran. Women in Iran and other Middle Eastern countries continue to protest to demand equal rights to the existing civil and social discriminatory laws.

In support of “One Million Signatures Campaign” since 2007, I have used the single word in Persian “Khodaya” which means “O God” which is not a religious term in Persian language but rather an everyday word which sometimes used for supplication to represent a signature. I will continue to repeat this word over and over in various work until it adds up to one million signature (near 500,000 so far) as a testimonial for the solidarity with the women in Iran and their worthy cause.

For example, in the body of work entitled: “Protest"; from my ongoing “Freedom” series, I examine the notion of peaceful protest especially since 2009 and its effect to bring positive changes around the world. Of course, we must note the historic 1963 March on Washington, and the “I have a Dream” peaceful protest led by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and how it has changed the courses of the history of a nation, but also, positively the lives of millions of people.

Since 2006 many courageous women in Iran have launched a “One Million-Signature Campaign” demanding changes to discriminatory civil laws against women's rights in Iran. Women in Iran and other Middle Eastern countries continue to protest to demand equal rights to the existing civil and social discriminatory laws.

In support of “One Million Signatures Campaign” since 2007, I have used the single word in Persian “Khodaya” which means “O God” which is not a religious term in Persian language but rather an everyday word which sometimes used for supplication to represent a signature. I will continue to repeat this word over and over in various work until it adds up to one million signature (near 500,000 so far) as a testimonial for the solidarity with the women in Iran and their worthy cause.

“What Will Befall Her?” is a series of large scale charcoal drawings on hand made Korean paper. Each image depicts female figures often against a backdrop of symbolic imagery and text and if not space employed is flat and stark. Some texts used in these images are from contemporary Iranian political poets in Persian calligraphy. Also, the drawings are designed in the persian carpet format which represents garden of paradise which traditionally is filled with colorful flowers, but in these drawings (Persian gardens) the color has been intentionally restricted to black and white, at once symbolizing the oppression, and stripping the work its to essential imagery and content.

The flowers and patterns used in these works are chosen very carefully to symbolize various topics related to women and girls. For example; lilies represent purity, innocence and essence of life where a little girl is standing on the sea of lilies in “What Will Befal Her?”, or the Alchemical roses in the borders of “ The Dishonor of War” is an ancient female symbol of the virgin daughter within the mother which contains female creative power. In “Women Are Not For Burning” the uprooted saffron flowers which is a religious / wedding ceremonial incense represent the bride burning in India in order to collect dowry. The fire flower used on the border of this work also represents the essential gift of the Goddess's of love and the palm tree represent male force. Iris is the messenger of heaven sent to gather up the souls of women. In the border of “The Fallen” which is a 20 feet long drawing the oak tree leaves represent power.

The scale which is a primary factor puts the viewer into a one to one relationship with the images. The images confront the viewer, yet do not overwhelm, but do command attention and space. The women are nude, as the intent is to show them without the "veils" of restrictions, assumptions, and cultural roles. The nobility of women stands out in the plain, bold and simple statement of contour line drawing on paper. I exhibit the work in installation format, employing the physical space of various venues to direct the viewer’s interactions with these images. Each drawing stands on its own, yet, the dynamic created when ten or more of these images are viewed simultaneously is quite impacting.

The interest in the complexity of cultural identity, a sense of belonging to a particular place, a place in society, or a place called “home”… The childhood memories, the language and poetry of the motherland… The pull of the past and the force of the future is like a thread interwoven in the fabric of my work where, as an Iranian-American artist, I choose to advocate for human / women’s & children's rights and freedom of expression. Exile as a form of a forced human condition on displaced individuals has been misunderstood and misused in many ways, especially in contemporary settings. Growing up in Tehran in a Baha’i household with parents of Zoroastrian and Muslim backgrounds in a neighborhood where Armenians, Turks and Jews were living peacefully together, I learned early on that each human being has a story of survival to tell. I also learned that most of ethnic and religious minorities initially chose Iran as their sanctuary, but were persecuted in some form or another as the power structures shifted and changed. Much intolerance and persecution continues in the aftermath of the 1979 Revolution.

In Iran, a country where the right to freedom, liberty and equality are violated daily; in a country where just in one month (February 21-March 21st) human rights defenders documented more than 13,000 incidents of violation of human rights of women, workers, ethnic minorities, religious minorities, students etc.; in a country that has the highest death penalty per capita and the second highest number of executions after China; in a country that is demanding the eradication of laws protecting women and girls because they are considered a threat to national security. In Iran the prisoners of conscious are still fighting for freedom for all and give their lives for it... After the green movement in Iran, many people who disputed the election were arrested, tortured, raped and killed. The Kahrizak prison personnel in Norther Teheran committed the most atrocities against people of Iran. The Eevin Prison is also notorious for its inhumane treatment of its prisoners.