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Présences artistiques iraniennes : Création et résistance

Revue interartistique « Couturière » - n° 1

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Published on Wednesday, September 25, 2024

Abstract

Ce numéro vise à offrir une analyse pluridisciplinaire des arts iraniens contemporains en adoptant une approche pluri-artistique (théâtre, cinéma, arts visuels, musique…). Nous nous attacherons à examiner les compromis que les artistes vivant en Iran doivent trouver pour témoigner et dénoncer la vérité politique sans être censurés, ainsi que les difficultés rencontrées en exil : le sentiment de déracinement, la recherche de leur place dans un nouveau contexte, et leur engagement à représenter les injustices étatiques en Iran. Comme le souligne Shirin Neshat, artiste en exil pour son travail artistique « l’art iranien est un art politique si ce n’est pas politique ce n’est pas un art iranien. »

Announcement

Argument

As Paul Ardenne highlights, the role of the contemporary artist, as the "artisan of the social," lies in their commitment to encouraging the public to reflect and react. Through this engagement, contemporary artists seek to generate debates around crucial issues such as inequalities or environmental crises.

In his report titled "Renewing Artistic Practices," Yolan de Padilla points out the emergence, in recent years, of artists’ paths that have deliberately renounced traditional forms and usual art spaces to embed themselves at the heart of social dynamics. In this context of redefining the relationship between the artist, their work, and society, where do Iranian artistic practices stand from the 1980s onwards, in a country where the younger generation is experiencing significant social and political changes ?

For this second issue of Couturière magazine, we explore the stakes of Iranian artistic creation by examining the social and political contexts in which Iranian artists, whether in Iran or in exile, evolve. Between censorship, exile, and the quest for international recognition, these creators face issues that shape both their art and their testimony. This issue continues the reflection initiated with the Iran Pavilion at the 2023 Avignon Festival and the New Persian Images Festival in Vitré, aiming to analyze the connections Iranian artists maintain with their homeland as well as with an international audience.

This issue seeks to offer a multidisciplinary analysis of contemporary Iranian arts through a multi-artistic approach (theater, cinema, visual arts, music…). We will focus on examining the compromises that artists living in Iran must make to testify and denounce political truths without being censored, as well as the difficulties encountered in exile : the feeling of uprooting, the search for their place in a new context, and their commitment to representing state injustices in Iran. As Shirin Neshat, an artist in exile, points out about her artistic work, "Iranian art is political art, if it’s not political, it’s not Iranian art." We do not lack examples of artists censored in Iran, such as Jafar Panahi, or exiled artists like Golshifteh Farahani, Zar Amir Ebrahimi, Bahman Beyzai, and Mohammad Rasoulof in the field of cinema, or Mandana Moghadam, Parastou Forouhar, and the younger generation of visual artists such as Anahita Razmi and Mehregan Pezeshki.

We welcome contributions from various theoretical fields such as aesthetics, philosophy of art, sociology, cultural history, information and communication sciences, as well as media theory, among others. By addressing these themes, our goal is to highlight critical voices that question the tensions between private and public space, tradition and modernity, as well as the local and the global in Iranian artistic works.

Here are some interdisciplinary avenues and questions : How do Iranian arts fit into the global framework of engaged art ? Is Iranian identity in exile an obstacle or a catalyst for artistic innovation ? How does the aesthetics of censorship influence artistic creation in Iran, and what are its philosophical and political implications ?

Suggestions, Areas of Focus

Artistic Creation under Constraint and Censorship in Iran

In 2009, Bahman Ghobadi’s film No One Knows About Persian Cats sheds light on the underground scene of the new Iranian musical wave. This youth devised creative ways to express themselves through music. How do local artists manage to express themselves ? What aesthetic or symbolic strategies do they use to circumvent censorship ? Can we speak of an aesthetics of resistance in Iranian art ?

Exile and Its Artistic Resonances

What are the impacts of exile on the artistic practice of Iranian creators ? How do artists in exile maintain a connection to their cultural roots and the struggles in Iran ? To what extent does exile create a creative bifurcation, giving rise to new forms of hybrid expression ? For instance, we can explore the journeys of exiled artists such as Mehran Tamadon, whose early films were shot in Iran, while his latest documentaries reconstruct the situation of Iranian political prisoners in France.

Art and Activism

Since the assassination of Jina Mahsa Amini, the drawings of Mana Neyestani and Kianoush Ramezani have been carried by Iranian protesters. What role does art play in protest movements (for example, the women’s rights protests or the "Women, Life, Freedom" movement) ? How do works produced in both Iran and abroad represent the population’s dissent against an oppressive regime ?

Gender and Minorities in Iranian Artistic Creation

Parnia Shams (Is) and Ghazi Rabihavi (The Boys of Love), for example, sensitively depict this reality : in Iranian society, the marginalized must hide or flee. What are the specificities of women’s artistic experiences in Iran ? How do artists from sexual, religious, or ethnic minorities incorporate their marginality into their works ? What role does the body and its image play, sometimes as object, sometimes as subject, in contemporary Iranian art ?

Technology, Networks, and New Spaces of Expression

Mahnaz Shirali explores Iran by analyzing how Iranians use social media : "In order to understand the world of young people in one of the most closed societies of the 21st century, social media opens a window onto a country that is currently disconnected from the rest of the world ; a window that leads to broader reflections on Iranian society." How do Iranian artists use social media and new technologies to express themselves beyond the visible and invisible borders of free expression ?

Submission Guidelines

Article proposals (3,000 characters + short bio-bibliography) must be submitted, to the following three email addresses : revuecouturiere@gmail.com, laurent.garreau3@lecnam.net, and parya.vatankhah@gmail.com.

by December 30, 2024

Responses will be provided by January 15, 2025.

Final texts (between 20,000 and 30,000 characters) must be submitted to the same addresses by the deadline of May 15, 2025, and must comply with the author guidelines provided by the publisher Classiques Garnier.

Scientific direction of the issue

  • Laurent Garreau (DICEN-Idf, INSEAC du CNAM, France) 
  • Parya Vatankhah (Université Paris 8, France), dir.

Editorial committee

  • Mohammed Ajbilou – Secrétaire de rédaction (Université Paris Cité, France)
  • Emmanuelle André (Université Paris Cité, France)
  • Marco Antonio Sousa Alvès (Université Fédérale du Minas Gerais, Brésil)
  • Isabelle Barbéris (Université Paris Cité, France)
  • Clarisse Bardiot (Université Rennes II, France)
  • Laure de Chantal (Écrivaine et éditrice, France)
  • David Christoffel (Musicien et poète, France)
  • Diego Gachadouat Ranz, (Université Paris Cité, France)
  • Laurent Garreau (DICEN-Idf, INSEAC du CNAM)
  • Christophe Génin (Université Paris I Panthéon-Sorbonne, France)
  • Jacques Gilbert (Nantes Université, France)
  • Patricia Luce Limido (Université Paris Cité, France)
  • Marie-Anne Lescourret (Université de Strasbourg, France)
  • Patrick Marcolini (Université Paul Valéry, Montpellier 3, France)
  • Pierre Philippe-Meden (Université Paul Valéry, Montpellier 3, France)
  • Martial Poirson (Université Paris 8, France)
  • Mozhdeh Sameti (Universités de Szeged (Hongrie), et deTéhéran (Iran))

Places

  • Paris, France (75)

Date(s)

  • Monday, December 30, 2024

Keywords

  • Iran, art contemporain, création, résistance

Reference Urls

Information source

  • Mohammed Ajbilou
    courriel : revuecouturiere [at] gmail [dot] com

License

CC0-1.0 This announcement is licensed under the terms of Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal.

To cite this announcement

« Présences artistiques iraniennes : Création et résistance », Call for papers, Calenda, Published on Wednesday, September 25, 2024, https://doi.org/10.58079/12ch2

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