Shirin Neshat: Land of Dreams

In her latest body of work, multimedia artist Shirin Neshat (b. 1957) turns her focus to the American West. With more than 100 photographs, a two-channel video installation, and a feature film, Neshat creates a multilayered, nuanced look at contemporary America through the eyes of a fictionalized artist. Monumental black-and-white photographs are transformed through Neshat's use of Farsi text and images that have been hand drawn onto the picture. The texts represent Neshat's interpretation of the dreams of the sitter, with references to ancient myths and ideologies. Neshat notes, "With Land of Dreams, the intention was that while we are following the life of this woman who’s haunted by these two worlds – Iran and US, dream and reality – we are also really understanding the malice of a society that is spying on people’s subconscious for whatever selfish reasons. There is definitely a question of collecting data on people, but also there’s a lot of references to racism, bigotry, political injustice, poverty." Neshat works and continues to experiment with the mediums of photography, video and film, which she imbues with highly poetic and politically charged images and narratives that question issues of power, religion, race, gender and the relationship between the past and present, occident and orient, individual and collective through the lens of her personal experiences as an Iranian woman living in exile. Land of Dreams accompanies Neshat's solo show at SITE Santa Fe (October 7, 2022-January 13, 2023).

Shirin Neshat is an Iranian-born artist and filmmaker living in New York. Neshat has held numerous solo exhibitions at museums internationally including the Pinakothek der Moderne, Munich; Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth; The Broad, Los Angeles; Museo Correr, Venice, Italy, Hirshhorn Museum, and the Detroit Institute of Arts. Neshat has directed three feature-length films, Women Without Men (2009), which received the Silver Lion Award for Best Director at the 66th Venice International Film Festival, Looking For Oum Kulthum (2017), and most recently Land of Dreams, which premiered at the Venice Film Festival (2021). Neshat was awarded the Golden Lion Award, the First International Prize at the 48th Biennale di Venezia (1999), and the Praemium Imperiale award for Painting in (2017). She is represented by Gladstone Gallery in New York and Goodman Gallery in London.