Haji
2008
Ink on color print mounted on Dibond, handwritten ink calligraphy
152.4 x 101.6 cm (60 x 40 in.)
Haji is a very large colour still printed from Iranian photographer and filmmaker Shirin Neshat’s 2008 video Faezeh. This work marks the meeting between documentary modernity and tradition, which the artist expressed by covering the photograph with a text from the video handwritten in calligraphy in black ink.
Faezeh tells the tragic story of a Muslim woman destroyed by a rape that dashes her hopes and gradually drives her mad. In Neshat's photograph Haji, an old man stares us in the eye with a worried gaze that seems to reflect the anxiety of an oppressed Iranian society facing an uncertain future.
Haji, which is in the Pinault Collection, was presented during the 2009 exhibition "Un certain état du monde ?" (“A Certain State of the World?”) at the Garage Center for Contemporary Culture in Moscow.
Faezeh tells the tragic story of a Muslim woman destroyed by a rape that dashes her hopes and gradually drives her mad. In Neshat's photograph Haji, an old man stares us in the eye with a worried gaze that seems to reflect the anxiety of an oppressed Iranian society facing an uncertain future.
Haji, which is in the Pinault Collection, was presented during the 2009 exhibition "Un certain état du monde ?" (“A Certain State of the World?”) at the Garage Center for Contemporary Culture in Moscow.
Exhibitions
© Shirin Neshat
Courtesy Galerie Jérôme de Noirmont, Paris
© Shirin Neshat
Courtesy Galerie Jérôme de Noirmont, Paris
