Biography

I began my artistic practice with painting and, over the years, expanded my artistic language through exploring different media, materials, and techniques. Gradually, I moved toward video art and installation—mediums that have allowed me to create spaces and offer the viewer a more direct and immersive experience.

In my work, I explore the human experience, memory, light, life, and the conditions that surround me. Throughout my practice, I have continuously searched for ways to transform these concerns into visual and sensory experiences.

I hold an M.A. in Painting and have worked as a faculty member at the Faculty of Art and Architecture of Islamic Azad University. I have also served as the head of the Graphic Design Department and the Fashion Design Department. I am a full member of the Iranian Painters Association and an honorary member of the Iranian Visual Arts Center.

Throughout my professional career, I have participated in more than 18 solo exhibitions and over 200 group exhibitions and festivals in Iran and internationally. My video works have also been selected and recognized at several international events and festivals.

Artist Statement

For me, art is a way of reflecting on the human condition and on our relationship with ourselves, with others, and with the world around us. In the acceleration of contemporary life, amid war, violence, migration, and the relentless flow of images, the human being gradually becomes distanced from their own origins.

I work across painting, video art, installation, and tapestry, choosing each medium according to the needs of the idea. Themes such as identity, memory, nature, lived experience, violence, and human vulnerability are interconnected throughout my work.

Cultural memory, mythology, traditional patterns and textures, and the language of warp, weft, and knot are not, for me, nostalgic returns to the past, but ways of entering into a dialogue with the present. Nature, too, is never separate from the human being in my work. I see humanity as part of the larger cycle of existence, suspended between light and darkness, creation and destruction, being and disappearance, freedom and captivity.

For me, the process of creation is a moment of presence and discovery—a point at which the boundary between the artist and the surrounding world begins to dissolve. Creation is not merely the making of an artwork; it is a form of presence, discovery, and coexistence with existence.

My works do not seek to offer definitive answers. Rather, they invite the viewer to pause, reflect, and enter into a personal experience suspended between memory and the present, the human being and the world, reality and metaphor.

CV

FARIDEH SHAHSAVARANI

Interdisciplinary Artist
Painter · Photographer · Video Artist · Installation Artist
Born: 1334 / 1955, Iran

EDUCATION

M.A. in Painting
Azad University, Tehran, Iran

ACADEMIC & PROFESSIONAL POSITIONS

Faculty Member
Faculty of Art and Architecture, Azad University, Tehran, Iran

Head of the Graphic Design Department
Faculty of Art and Architecture, Azad University
1380–1382

Head of the Fashion Design Department
Faculty of Art and Architecture, Azad University
1392–1395

PROFESSIONAL MEMBERSHIPS

• Full Member, Iranian Painters Association
• Member, Visual Artists Association of Canada
• Honorary Member, Iranian Visual Arts Center
• Member, Art Group “30”

EXHIBITIONS & FESTIVALS

SELECTED SOLO EXHIBITIONS

18 Solo Exhibitions
Iran and internationally

SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS & INTERNATIONAL EVENTS

• First Iranian Art Festival — Al Jassra Cultural Center, Qatar — 1376
• Women Artists of Iran Art Festival — Centro Fieristico Lecce, Italy — 1386
• Cité Internationale des Arts — Paris, France — Painting and Video Art — 1383
• Iranian Garden Exhibition — Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art, Iran — Reaching Toward the Light — 1383/1384
• Selby Gallery — Sarasota, Florida, USA — Selected Works and Video Art — 1387
• Chahar Ghesmat: Iranian Women Create — Akus Gallery, Eastern Connecticut State University, USA — 1389
• Contemporary Iranian Art — Albion Gallery, Australia — I Will Be Back — 1391
• A Decade of Video Art in Iran — Iranian Artists Forum, Tehran — 1392
• International Painting Art Symposium — UNESCO, Santorini, Greece — 1397
• International Video Art Festival — Casablanca, Morocco — 1398

18 Solo Exhibitions and more than 200 Group Exhibitions
Iran and internationally

AWARDS, SELECTIONS & RECOGNITION

Selected Works & International Selections

• Lullaby With a Little Spice (BOMB) — Athens International Video Art Festival, Greece — 1387
• Untitled — Mondial International Video Art Festival, Paris, France — 1387
• I Wrote, You Read — Moscow International Film Festival, Media Forum — 1388
• I Will Be Back — Moscow International Film Festival, Media Forum — 1389
• I Wrote, You Read — New York International Video Art Festival — 1390
• Circulus Vitiosus — Sweden International Video Art Festival — 1390
• Untitled — International Videoformes Festival, France — 1392
• H2O3 — International Videoformes Festival, France — 1395

Awards & Certificates

• Honorary Diploma — Selected Work
• First Experimental Painting and Graphic Exhibition, Tehran — 1372
• Certificate of Appreciation
• International Women’s Art Festival, Niavaran Cultural Center, Tehran — 1386
• Trophy and Certificate of Appreciation — Selected Work
• Third New Art Exhibition, Saba Museum, Tehran — 1387
• Certificate of Academic Appreciation
• Fifth International Fashion and Clothing Festival Fajr — 1395
• Selected Artists
• Art for Peace, Geneva, Switzerland — 1396

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VIDEO ART & NEW MEDIA

Selected Works

• MOUTRA — 2005 · Video Art · 5 min
• Reaching Toward the Light — 2005 · Video Installation · 7 min
• I Wrote, You Read — 2006 · Site-specific Installation / Video Installation
• I Will Be Back — 2008–2009 · Video Art · 8 min
• Duality — 2012 · Video Art Series
• Untitled — 2013 · Video Art · 4 min 20 sec
• H2O3 — 2014 · Video Art · 1 min 20 sec

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JURY, SELECTION & CURATORIAL ACTIVITIES

• Jury, Scientific Section — Fourth International Fashion and Clothing Festival Fajr — 1394
• Member, Strategic Council and Academic Committee — National Fashion and Clothing — 1393–1395
• Secretary — First National Clothing and Dress Festival, Azad University — 1395
• Member, Planning Council — Sixth Tajalli Ehsas Exhibition
• Member, Expert Group — Review of Video Artist Activities — 1391–present
• Speaker and Art Critic — Second Video Artist Festival, Isfahan Art Center — 1392
• Selection Committee Member — First Video Artist Festival, Isfahan — 1391
• Selected Jury Member — Multimedia Art Exhibition, Iranian Artists Forum, Tehran — 1391

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RESEARCH & PUBLICATIONS

• “Why Art?” — Architecture & Urbanism, No. 100, Autumn 1389
• “Mahmoud Khan Malek al-Sho’ara Saba Kashani” — Naghshmaye Magazine — 1394
• “Study of Shared Structural Patterns in the Formation of Iranian Gardens” — University of Tabriz — 1397

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FILM & DOCUMENTARY

Research

• Researcher — Nakhoda Babu
• Producer: Persian Gulf Center — 1390
• Researcher — Mining in the Desert, from the series Life in the Desert
• Producer: Morteza Razagh Karimi — 1391

Art Direction & Directing

• Art Director — Estensakh (Art History)
• Producer: Mehran Haghighi — 1393
• Director — Design and Pattern of Qom Carpet
• Handmade Works Documentary Series
• Cultural Heritage, Handicrafts and Tourism Organization

TEACHING & ACADEMIC ACTIVITIES

Teaching and academic activities in:

• Painting
• Handicrafts
• Graphic Design
• Industrial Design
• Photography
• Architecture
• Interior Architecture
• Landscape Architecture
• Fashion Design

PRESS & CRITICAL REFERENCES

• The Washington Post — Lavanya Ramanathan, Iranians Abroad, Style, June 21, 2007 — reference to MOUTRA
• Encyclopedia of Art — Rooien Pakbaz, Encyclopedia of Art, Vol. II — entry on Farideh Shahsavarani