Art in the Auditorium - Shahryar Nashat and Ryan Trecartin
Whitechapel Art Gallery, London
1 October - 7 November 2008

Shahryar Nashat creates films and installations that revolve around coercion; the power struggle inherent in the relationship between the individual and traditional institutional powers; religion, corporate interest, the state and even art and history. In the three films premiered in the UK at the Whitechapel, Nashat looks at how the threat of violence can be translated into physical and linguistic containment that restricts possibilities of expression. See previous Nokteez article on Nashat here.

Ryan Trecartin’s films, by contrast, propose extrovert and exuberant characters, performed by a close community of friends who inhabit an unfettered world. Marked by physical and linguistic excess, the films are immersed in Internet-based, image-heavy culture, informed by TV, movies, music videos, advertising and YouTube. Trecartin’s fast-paced editing and multi-layered, energetic screenplays use low-fi ‘make-do’ props, costumes and an un-slick digital aesthetic, influenced by the filmmakers such as Kenneth Anger, John Smith and John Waters.

For more information about the show visit the Whitechapel website here.

Routes: An exhibition of contemporary Middle Eastern Art
Waterhouse & Dodd , London W1S 3ND
7-25 October 2008

Routes will showcase the work of 15 emerging artists from around the globe and will bring together sculptors, photographers, printmakers and painters originally from the Middle East and Arab world.

Iranian artists represented in Routes include pioneers such as Parviz Tanavoli, Charles Hossein Zenderoudi, Monir Shahroudy Farmanfarmian and as well as younger contemporary artists including Farhad Moshiri, Shirin Neshat, Afsoon and many more.

For more information, visit the Routes website here.

Film: Gilaneh
Asia House, London
6.45pm, Tuesday 14 October, 2008

A rare chance to see Gilaneh, an anti-war film by Iranian filmmakers Rakhshan Bani-Etemad and Mohsen Abdolvahab.
On the Iranian New Year of 1988, Gilaneh (Motamed Arya), a woman from the country whose only son Ishmael (Bahram Radan) is fighting in the Iran-Iraq war, takes a perilous trip into besieged Tehran with her pregnant daughter.

Fifteen years later, on March 20, 2003, as another New Year approaches, fatigued Gilaneh cares for her bedridden son as TV newscasts cover America’s opening attack on Baghdad.

Part of the 30 Years of Solitude exhibition at Asia House Gallery in London, on Nokteez here. Book tickets here.

One Day seminar: How Can we be Iranian, Women and Artists?
Saturday 27 September, 2-6.30pm

A day of talks and films as part of the The 30 Years of Solitude exhibition at Asia House Gallery in London, chaired by Dr Venetia Porter. Films include Mona Zandi Haghighi’s 2006 film, On a Friday Afternoon and Mitra Farahani’s 2002 film Just a Woman. Talks and discussions start at 4.15pm with Dr Shiva Balaghi, Goli Taraghi and Faryar Javaherian.

For more information and to book tickets visit the Asia House website here.

30 Years of Solitude
Asia House Gallery, London
27 September 2008 - 10 January 2009

The 30 Years of Solitude exhibition brings together a selection of works by some of Iran’s most talented and extraordinary women artists and filmmakers. Through photography and film it focuses on the feelings of anxiety, isolation and the sense of loss that Iranian society, and women artists in particular, have been experiencing in the last 30 years, living in Iran.

One of the most remarkable aspects of the exhibition is the sense of humour with which the artists tackle their problems, addressing major issues such as Islamic paternalism, loss of identity, isolation from the rest of the world, the Iranian Revolution and the devastating eight-year war with Iraq from 1981-1989 where thousands of teenagers ran to martyrdom.

30 Years of Solitude shows that the contemporary art of Iran has been hugely influenced by the traumatic historic events of the last three decades, and that millions of Iranians have been affected by them in one way or another. As Faryar Javaherian, the exhibition curator says “Art was a way to exorcise all the evils witnessed during the war and the Revolution. After World War II there was a similar outburst of art, literature and philosophy in Europe”.

The images and stories in this exhibition provide an unmissable opportunity to discover more about Iran. There will also be a film and seminar programme that will explore issues raised in the Exhibition as well as a cooking class, literary evening and other smaller art exhibitions.

For more information and to book tickets, visit the Asia House website here.

Night Bus
26 August 2008
UK Film Premiere
Renoir Cinema, London WC1N 1AW

Night Bus finally gets its UK premiere as part of the the first Asia House Festival of Asian Film at the Renoir Cinema in August. Directed by Kiumars Pourahmad, Night Bus (2007) takes place on a single night during the Iran-Iraq war of the 1980s. A young private is assigned the difficult mission of delivering a bus full of POWs from the front line back to Iran. He faces a long, dark night on the rickety bus with an elderly nagging driver. When his fellow soldier is blinded by a roadside mortar, he is left on his own with a busload of hostile prisoners.

Winner of the 2007 Asia Pacific Screen Awards: Grand Jury Prize and 2007 Iran Cinema Celebration in the Best Film and Best Screenplay category.

To book tickets visit the Renoir Cinema website here.

The Kamkars
27 September 2008, 8pm
Barbican Centre, London

The Kamkars are back in the UK as part of the Barbican’s Ramadan Nights festival this September. One of Iran‘s leading music ensembles the Kurdish family of singers and instrumentalists perform intricate arrangements of traditional folk songs.

The Kamkars family are from Sena - seven brothers, their sister and her son, were inspired to play by the father, Hassan Kamkar, a composer who founded the Sena Academy of Music in the Kurdish-speaking region of the country. The Kamkars’ repertoire is richly diverse, drawing on the ancient history and long cultural traditions of the region and achieving a striking emotional and spiritual range. The group has a wide appeal outside Iran, and has staged many concerts in the Kurdish cities of Iraq, and in 2001 also performed in the Turkish cities of Istanbul and Diyarbakir.

In 1997 the band invited other masters of music in Iran to found the Kamkars Open Music Institute in Tehran, which is actively encouraging the development of new musical talent in the country. The Kamkars’ UK tour in 2004, where the group performed with London Symphony Orchestra has led to further symphonic collaborations. The group’s latest CD, Tara, is about to be released in North Eastern Iraq for their audience of Iraqi Kurds.

To book to tickets to see the Kamkars live at the Barbican, click here.

To coincide with The Lure of the East: British Orientalist Painting exhibition at Tate Britain, see previous article here, Nokteez has 10 pairs of tickets to giveaway to see the exhibition before it closes on 31 August 2008. To enter the competition, simply email your name and postal address to editors [at] nokteez [dot] com

The first ten people to enter win a pair of tickets each and will be notified by email.

To book tickets to see The Lure of the East: British Orientalist Painting at Tate Britain, visit their website here.

Farhad Ahrarnia
Stitched
Leighton House Museum, London
13 August – 6 September

Meet the artist: 13 August, 3 pm

Stitched is the first solo exhibition in London by Farhad Ahrarnia, an Iranian artist based in Britain. It features recent works in a range of media including photography, embroidery and video. Ahrarnia works with images of celebrities, Iranian royalty and contemporary international current affairs (such as the Bradford Riots
suspects or American soldiers who died in Baghdad), which he takes from print and online media.

These images are digitally printed onto canvas and painstakingly embroidered with colourful thread.
By interrupting the surface of these seemingly simple images with his stitches, Ahrarnia uncovers layers of meaning and complex ideology embedded within them.

Stitched is one of four exhibitions in the Here We Are series of exhibitions curated by Rose Issa, independent curator and specialist in visual arts from the Middle East and North Africa.

For more information on the exhibition Stitched and to buy tickets, click here.

The Lure of the East: British Orientalist Painting
Tate Britain, London
Until 31 August 2008

The Lure of the East: British Orientalist Painting explores the responses of British artists to the cultures and landscapes of the Near and Middle East between 1780 and 1930, offering historical and cultural perspectives on the challenging questions of the ‘Orient’ and its representation in British art. It brings together over 120 paintings, prints and drawings of bazaars, public baths, domestic interiors and religious sites. Although there are pieces set in Persia, the exhibition primarily covers those areas that were relatively accessible, particularly following the development of steamboat and rail travel in the 1830s including Egypt, Palestine and Turkey.

The exhibition reveals the wealth of Orientalist painting which followed the arrival of steam travel in the nineteenth century. Art and tourism flourished in places that were now relatively easy to reach by boat, and artists were drawn to visit and paint the areas they explored including Cairo, Jerusalem and Istanbul (Constantinople), often travelling via Spain and Morocco, or through Greece and the Balkans. The exhibition examines how British painters sought to convince their audiences of the authenticity of their images, often by using intensely detailed compositions. It also shows how deriving drama and romance from the Orient was central to their work.

For information on the show and to buy tickets visit the Tate Britain website here.