Tuesday, April 21, 2009

Profile : Gohar Dashti


Presenting another Iranian female photographer Gohar Dashti after my earlier post on Shadi Gadhirian . Even if both photographers working in different style have a common eye to report the post-war generation showing the fragile world seen from the woman's angle. Here a note of his work which I liked a lot:
Iranian photographer Gohar Dashti was born in 1980 after the Islamic Revolution. Her photographs reflect a post-war generation couple in Iran who are symbolic of the times. Because the Revolution never resolved issues of social poverty and the ensuing war with Iraq derailed their social prospects, this was a time of isolation and unprecedented despair. Dashti’s generation has inherited the legacy of war and continues to be entangled in the memories and related realities. Her photographs represent this heritage of violence and how it permeates all aspects of contemporary society by depicting a couple in a fictionalized battlefield as they interact with the everyday—for instance, watching television, surfing on the Internet, or celebrating a wedding. While her couple does not visibly express emotion, the pair nevertheless has a sense of perseverance, determination and survival. Dashti creates moments that capture the irony and ongoing duality of life and war without precluding the possibility of hope.