gita hashemi

many worlds in one

projects

grounding: states of gender (2017)

A durational embodied writing performance, Grounding combines life writing with live writing. In this piece I write in Farsi life stories shared with me by an Iranian woman named Zahra. The performance was streamed live and blogged over the duration of a residency at Carleton University. The narrative emerged through conversations about how being women has affected our lives in obvious and not-so-obvious ways, how our lives are marked by our gender. What was shared was Zahra’s writing in response to a series of questions I posed. She is the writer. I am the editor and the scribe.

Grounding was the first part in Open Space Lab artist residencies at Carlton University Art Gallery curated by Anna Khimasia. It was selected as 2017 best monographic exhibition of the year by the Ontario Association of Art Galleries. From jury's comments:

[Grounding] is a multi-layered, performative and collaborative exhibition which incorporates electronic media in the dissemination of the artist’s drawing process on and beyond the gallery walls. Formal and cultural aspects are intertwined in a series of calligraphic manuscripts rooted in representations of freedom and gender that “transgress geographical, political and cultural boundaries.

This work is available for exhibition as an installation consisting of 22 scrolls - total area 84f x 12f - and/or one- or multi-channel video. It may also be re-created as a site-specific live performance and installation.

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