ART CITIES:Salzburg-Farhad Moshiri

Recognized for his ironic pieces of art that represent hybrids between traditional Iranian forms and those of the globalized pop culture widespread in his country, Farhad Moshiri’s artworks are often very fantastical, but at the end, they have a cynical and sarcastic note as the punch line.

By Efi Michalarou
Photo: Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac Archive

In his solo exhibition “First Snow”, Farhad Moshiri introduces a new visual vocabulary in his work. Moshiri has been producing canvasses out of beads throughout his career, but for the first time, the works are based on photographs Moshiri took on the dirt road right outside of his studio in the city of Lavasan, which is 40 minutes outside of Tehran. The photographs remained in a box in his studio for a number of years. Recently, he came upon them, and decided to transform them into large-scale canvasses. First, Moshiri drew the images of the snowy forest on canvasses. Then, he sent them out to a group of Iranian women he has been. Each of the women hand embroidered the drawings with beads, creating a textured, glistening surface that closely resembles the initial photograph. By representing a lush nature with no temporal and spacial reference, Moshiri allows for the forest to stand as a counterpart to civilization. The series could be seen as a meditation on the essence of nature, or as an allegory of an inner world. Moshiri was born in Shiraz, Iran, in 1963 and his father owned a number of cinemas. Throughout his childhood, Moshiri watched American films. In the aftermath of the Iranian Revolution, his family immigrated to Los Angeles, where Moshiri studied the California Institute of the Arts. During his studies the artist encountered Michael Asher, John Baldessari and Don Buchla. At the same time, he experimented with a wide range of media including installations, video art and painting. Upon graduation in 1984, he spent several years in the USA and returned to Iran 1991. A decade after Moshiri came back to Tehran, he became internationally known for his large-scale oil paintings of jars and bowls that served as a metaphor for desire, life and memory.

Info: Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac-Villa Kast, Mirabellplatz 2, Salzburg, Duration: 27/1-17/3/18, Days & Hours: Tue-Fri 10:00-18:00, Sat 10:00-14:00, http://ropac.net