Shirin Neshat

Born in Iran in 1957, Shirin Neshat is best known for self-portraits in which she appears in a body-covering black chador, occasionally carrying a weapon. Gender politics is her subject, and the repression of women, whether through fundamentalism or cultural exoticism, is her target. Since 1984, Neshat has steadily gained a reputation for powerful, confrontational photographs that invert the expectations Westerners have of Middle Eastern culture. Her determination to eliminate Western assumptions about Middle Eastern women - in particular the often-disturbing ties Westerners make between overt violence and hidden sensuality - results in imagery that wrests aesthetic and political freedom from the dominant culture. In Neshat's case those dominant cultures are both the imperial West and fundamentalist Iran. This volume is dedicated to Neshat's latest video installations, and includes a brief overview of the artist's career with images from her most important works.