Shirin Neshat

Escrito sobre el cuerpo, an exhibition by Shirin Neshat curated by Octavio Zaya, is open to the public at Telefónica Foundation. It offers a personal view of the relationship between body and politics in Islamic societies, and of the segregation between men and women in her country.

Neshat's works are among the holdings of Telefónica's Contemporary Photography Collection. Such is the case of Whispers (1997), included in the show, and accompanied on this occasion by some twenty photographs and two video-projections : Zarin and OverRuled, from 2005 and 2012, respectively.

The images on exhibit are grouped in the series Rapture, Tooba, and Women of Alah, and incorporate meditations on the social situation of women and the politicization of their bodies in the Islamic world, with constant references to literature and the Islamic tradition.

Given PhotoEspaña's focus on the body, this show emphasizes Shirin Neshat's use of the body to engage complex subjects such as gender differences, the stereotypes that separate the West and the East, and aspects of Islamic societies through their history.

Neshat received a Golden Lion at the 1999 Venice Biennale and a Silver Lion in the same event ten years later for Woman Without Men.