BOMB Magazine: Shirin Neshat by Arthur C. Danto

SN Yes.
BOMB Magazine: Shirin Neshat by Arthur C. Danto 5/17/10 1:58 PM
AD I thought so. It’s in color. There is a mythic quality to the black and white, but it
was important for what you were trying to do that you did use color. Aesthetically
it’s very successful. I felt that this was a conversation of a woman with herself. The
two screens work a bit the way they do in Turbulent; she sees herself and whether
it’s an image, a dream, or a memory—you can’t quite discover. Although there is
what I think of as the more traditional setting: there is a child and some tragedy is
implied. Whereas the worst thing that seems to be happening to the woman in the
other, Western setting is loneliness. That is to say she’s there and the crowds sweep
by, and she goes up the staircase. It reminded me of one of Maya Deren’s earlier
surrealist films. I thought it was wonderful by the way, but I felt at the same time
that it was tentative.
SN Many people, including critics and curators, have been comparing the last few
works I have made, telling me which one they think succeeds or does not work as
well. I think what is more important is the developmental process, and looking at
how each work visually and conceptually takes the ideas forward. Soliloquy has
almost no relation to the trilogy that we’ve been speaking about, but it’s a topic that
I had wanted to make a film about for a long time; and perhaps the most personal
work I’ve ever made. It’s about imagining the emotional state of a woman standing
at the threshold of two opposite worlds. She is constantly negotiating between two
cultures that are not just different from one another but in complete conflict. So
once again the idea of opposites applies but in a different way. The location in the
East [Turkey], where it was shot, is the place of her origin. It is ancient, traditional
and communal but also a controlling society, at times suffocating, as there is no
personal—individual—space. The location in the West [The United States] is in a
modern, free, extremely individualistic society where we sense a great personal
isolation and loneliness. By the end we find that the woman never quite feels at
peace in either space.
AD Do you feel at the end that both states of the woman, or stages, are rushing to
meet one another? How could you show that they do get together? Of course, it
would be impossible, but . . .
SN That is the ambiguity that I wanted to maintain; it’s not really clear where she
was running to or from. Once you leave your place of birth, there’s never a
complete sense of center: you’re always in the state of in between and nowhere
completely feels like home.
AD I understand you shot Soliloquy in Turkey, but do you have any plans to work in
Iran?
SN It has been a dream for me to finally work in my own country. Slowly, I am
advancing in that direction although the country is still in a state of flux so one
never really knows if it is completely safe to work there or not. But recently I did
have a major breakthrough. I was contacted by the minister of culture, the director
of the visual arts who also happens to be the director of the Museum of
Contemporary Art in Tehran! He officially invited me to come to Iran to work, exhibit
and meet with local artists. According to this gentleman, there should not be any
problems but I have been told to be cautious. However, if things don’t quite work in
Iran, I will go back to other Islamic countries, Morocco and Turkey, as I have been.
In all my work, I am dealing with issues that address historical, cultural,
sociopolitical ideas; but in the end, I want my work to transcend that and function
on the most primal and emotional level. I think the music intensifies the emotional
quality. Music becomes the soul, the personal, the intuitive and neutralizes the
sociopolitical aspects of the work. This combination of image and music is meant to
create an experience that moves the audience. It is an expectation that I have as
an artist and I want that intensity from any work of art; I want to be deeply
affected, almost like asking to have a religious experience. Beauty is important in
relation to my work. It is a concept that is most universal, it goes beyond our
cultural differences.
AD I believe that. There’s been a kind of cynicism in regard to beauty, that it’s
entirely relative. At any rate, I’m thinking myself about it a great deal,
philosophically. I’m trying to write a book on that.
SN It is particularly important in relation to my subject since in Islam, beauty is
critical, as it directly ties to ideas of spirituality and love of God.
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