SHIRIN NESHAT’S WOMEN DREAMING OF THEIR FREEDOM Cover Image

SHIRIN NESHAT’IN ÖZGÜRLÜKLERİNİ DÜŞLEYEN KADINLARI
SHIRIN NESHAT’S WOMEN DREAMING OF THEIR FREEDOM

Author(s): Mahpeyker Yönsel
Subject(s): Politics, Gender Studies, Visual Arts, Sociology of Culture
Published by: Sanat ve Dil Araştırmaları Enstitüsü
Keywords: Shirin Neshat; Iran; Gender; Woman; Political;

Summary/Abstract: After Islamic Revolution happened in Iran in 1979, the process of political, cultural and social transformation adversely affected women’s rights and freedoms in the private and public spheres. Women’s self-expression has been constrained and even hindered by forced gender roles in every sphere of life. Shirin Neshat who is an Iranian artist living in the United States, witnessed changes in the revolution, questioned the social identity and cultural ties all over and rejected the roles patriarchal thought approved for women when she returned her country after a break of ten years. She put up her struggle against hegemony on Iranian women with her works through the concepts including gender inequality, identity, belonging, feminism, political regime and beliefs. Neshat publicizes socio-political situations of Iranian women, whose the most basic rights such as the right of choice and the right to enjoy are taken, through the medium of her art rather than the concept of gender inequality that Western artists mostly deal with. This study, carried out with qualitative research methods, aims to introduce the artist, to understand her works and to think over the identity issues of Middle Eastern women that Shirin Neshat becomes a voice for via her series publicly known as “Women of Allah”.

  • Issue Year: 8/2019
  • Issue No: 57
  • Page Range: 587-596
  • Page Count: 9
  • Language: Turkish