Artistic Projects
Curatorial
Work
Info/Contact
Seperation Gardens
Presented in Montoro 12 in Brussels as a part of PERSEVERENCE V curated by Stephan Pollock
In this series of four paintings titled “Separation Gardens”, I bring four seperate layers of the painting process (Watercolour underpainting, Photo-transfer, Crystal formation, and Oil) into relation with four distinct bodies of text that reflect different forms of separation.
The first layer is inspired by “Lovers’ Daliance”, a 17 century painting by Muhamamd Qasim , which depicts a female space of intimacy in the backdrop of landscape of Isfahan, an idealized garden. This is a period in Safavid history prior to hardening of the boundaries, where the blurred borders between intimacy and friendship were not yet been subjected to heteronormative disciplining imposed by the Shi’a clergy and the state.
The title refers to a poem found in the travelogue of Shahrbanu Begom, a widowed woman from Urdubad, who embarks on a pilgrimage to mourn her deceased husband, but detours to visit a former “yar” and “refigh” whom she has been separated due to suspicions surrounding their relationship. In the third, I juxtaposed these blurred intimacies with the cut image of Merjan Abrahamian and Ethel Dmitros, two Armenian school friends from New Julfa, which I found in Project Save archives. Following the story of one of the women pictured , I speculated that her family later emigrated from Iran to the United States.
Migration ultimately binds all these layers together through a personal experience of separation I observed between my mother and her sisters while growing up. The photo-transferred poems, layer the Urdubadi woman’s poem with the words I wrote about my mother, who yearned throughout her life for sisters and loved ones lost to the united states of america. The past intimacies displaced to the futures shaped by rigid lines across bodies, spaces and time itself.
Watercolor, Photo Transfer, Oil, Salt, Liquid Bleach and Ammonia on wood, 50x35 cm, 2025
Photo credit: Sam Lomprez 2025