Beyond the «Chador Art»: reflections on the photographic works of Iranian artists Ghazaleh Hedayat e Newsha Tavakolian

Abstract

Iranian photography, with a long tradition, enters in a new phase with the policies promoted since 1997 by the reformist President Khatami at the same time as the development of new means of mass communication, which favor the significant and growing participation of women. The artists are confronted with reality and use the new media, exploiting the ease of production and distribution, when television and the Internet become powerful tools of political and religious propaganda in the global context. The article examines the female contribution to Iranian photography through the analysis of the work of Ghazaleh Hedayat and Newsha Tavakolian. Hedayat work on a series of reflections on the female body and herself as a woman and her rejection of the male view of the world. Tavakolian focuses on middle-class young people in Iran and the women’s issue in the Middle East and around the world with direct reference to everyday life. Their works tell the personal and collective experience in Iran and in the international context. The use of photography and the critical approach describe common elements to the two artists, even if each had an independent path and different objectives. Furthermore, the two artists overcome the geopolitically characterized border and the simplifying approach that are found, paradoxically, in the work of Shirin Neshat and other similar representatives of what is critically defined in Iran as «Chador Art».