 |
| Protestors in Tehran, 2026. Via social media. Courtesy picture alliance/Zuma Press Wire/Shutterstock and ArtAsiaPacific. |
by Aisha Traub Chan, ArtAsiaPacific
Mass antigovernment demonstrations have erupted across Iran over the past two weeks. According to the Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA), the Iranian authorities’ aggressive clampdown has led to at least 500 deaths and over 10,600 arrests. As the turmoil continues to unfold, Iranian artists are denouncing the Islamic regime’s violence and expressing their support for the protestors.
The rallies, which began in Tehran’s Grand Bazaar on December 28, 2025 over widespread inflation, have grown into the largest wave of civil unrest in the country since 2022, when Mahsa Jina Amini’s death in morality-police custody sparked public outrage. Following the government’s deadly response, officials enacted a nationwide internet blackout on January 8, cutting off domestic communication routes, as well as barricading the population from contact with the rest of the world.
Tehran-based filmmaker Jafar Panahi, whose work is banned in Iran, is among the flood of artists and cultural figures who are using social media to denounce the Iranian government. Panahi’s latest film, It Was Just an Accident (2025)—which explores themes of trauma, political oppression, and the collective struggle for liberation—marks his first creative project since being released from Evin Prison in Tehran three years ago, where he was incarcerated for disseminating anti-state propaganda. He issued a joint statement alongside filmmaker Mohammad Rasoulof, who fled to Germany in 2024 after state authorities sentenced him to eight years in prison as well as flogging. The post reads: “In recent days, following the presence of millions of Iranians in the streets protesting against the Islamic Republic, the government has once again resorted to its most blatant tools of repression.” Further addressing the internet shutdown, they called on international communities to “immediately find ways to facilitate access to vital information in Iran by enabling communication platforms.”
As reported by The Guardian, Iranian-born, UK-based painter Soheila Sokhanvari also turned to social media to raise awareness about the situation, urging for broader international coverage, particularly amid the blackout: “Innocent unarmed people are subjected to brutal force and live bullets with impunity in Iran. This is a revolution and not a protest. Please be their voice.” Sokhanvari, whose work probes the politics of identity, often through depictions of the female body, emphasized that documenting the protests “will tell the Iranian regime that the world is watching and their atrocities will not go unpunished.”
In Canada’s British Columbia, Iranian diaspora communities staged a rally of their own in solidarity with protestors in the homeland. On January 10, hundreds gathered in front of the Vancouver Art Gallery, many waving the historic, pre-revolution Iranian flag, which is no longer in official use but has seen renewed symbolic prominence in antigovernment demonstrations. Speaking with North Shore News, Mehdi Ghadimi, an Iranian activist and former journalist based in Vancouver, noted: “For the first time in many years, people are not only saying what they reject, but clearly stating what they want.”
In the face of escalating violence and instability, Iranian artists continue to speak out on the ongoing political repression and persecution, using trending hashtags #IranRevolution2026 and #DigitalblackoutIran to educate and inform the public, and reappropriating art organizations like the Vancouver Art Gallery as spaces for solidarity, discussion, and freedom of expression.
The Iranian government has not provided an official death toll, and HRANA is currently investigating 579 further reports of fatalities.
Aisha Traub Chan is an editorial intern at ArtAsiaPacific.
Via ArtAsiaPacific
No comments:
Post a Comment