OI Canada : Shirin Neshat “I am a nomad, I am always looking for new challenges. Art is not propaganda"
“I do not feel like a traditional artist, I have never been able to keep up with big events: I get bored quickly, I am afraid of repeating myself, I always feel the need to take on new challenges, even at the cost of failure. And in the end I always find my way.” Shirin Neshat is in Venice on the occasion of the Venice Film Festival to receive the film Life of Imagination. Visual Arts Award, a new recognition of cinema, Giornate degli Autori and NABA, an award from the New Academy of Fine Arts to those filmmakers who have distinguished themselves in other artistic practices of vision. And it is difficult to find figures like her on the international stage: a revolutionary photographer, director, able to win the Silver Lion with his debut film (Women without men2009), one of the most influential contemporary artists of recent decades, who has alternated between performance, video and opera.
The journey that began with Women of Allah (1993–97), a series of photographs exploring the position of women in Islamic fundamentalism: “I found inspiration,” Neshat says in a crowded workshop with NABA and Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia students, “when I returned to Iran, my hometown. where I was reunited with my family and was able to observe the changes and battles that revitalize the country. This work was devoted to the relationship between men and women, struggles and problems, spirituality and death. The Iranian parliament strongly opposed me, but at that moment the doors of art opened before me.”
The transition from stills to video was natural: “Creating video art means breaking down museum walls and breaking down barriers with the public. You have more freedom, you can resort to abstraction. This is something less poppy, more difficult to convey to the public, but thanks to the video, I got to know other worlds: dance, scenography, installations. Gradually, I began to understand how dialogue with the public can become an important part of society.”
In 2000 installation Zeal (“I wanted to capture a group of people, not just one”), 2008 Muniz AND Faeza which chronicle the sexual abuse suffered by women in an Iranian prison, many of whom later committed suicide (“I chose a surreal register, the goal was to be seen in different ways, thus asking viewers questions about possible angles of the story” 2016 was a series of two projects: Royrelated to the cinematic experience (“Working with actors, I learned how to relate to other people on set. And I began to see myself reflected in the people I filmed”), and Sarah (“A real projection of myself: I began to shape my dreams with images, always retelling feelings through images, not words.”)
Among the great meetings – meeting with Natalie Portman in Illusions and mirrors (2013): “An actress of talent and fame, but I decided to stay true to my way of acting: no words, only images.” In Search of Um Kulthum (2017) – portrait of an Egyptian singer: “I put myself to the test in a language that I did not know. It’s the story of the protagonist’s failures and I was able to learn more about the technical side of filmmaking.” She returned to Venice last year with dream land, where he uses photography and cinema at the same time: “This is a double video installation and a photo series. I sent a photographer to knock on the doors of American houses and ask people what they dream about. The voice gradually begins to penetrate into my work. I want to tell little stories, keep the rhythm, see if the same story can be told from different points of view.”
This is an extremely personal, but not autobiographical work: “These stories are based on my human experience. I am Iranian, but also a nomad. About Iran I cannot say all that I would like and should, nor about the United States: it does not belong to one country or another.” But can art be a political tool? “I am not interested in realism or condemnation of Iranian political issues, I try to keep activism out of the way. I like to experiment, creating art that should never be about what is good and what is bad, otherwise it would turn into propaganda. On the difficulties of creating my work: “I don’t think I enjoyed any privileges: if my work is presented in large institutions, such as the Venice Biennale, for example, it is because I have not allowed myself to be intimidated by the system, it tends to exclude certain categories. people from certain jobs.”
And to young people, he says: “Art should be created in response to passion and an irresistible desire to create, without thinking about profit or fame, which lead nowhere. Contacts can be important, but everything should start with ideas. It is important to surround ourselves with people we trust and who can help us learn what we do not know. And we must find something to inspire us by asking ourselves what and to whom we want to say, without fear and arrogance.
* thanks for the cooperation of Beatriz Anaclerio.