Hope Moves History Towards Freedom

Materials Rich in Resistance

Soli Kiani (b. 1981) is an Iranian-born, Vienna-based artist who incessantly pokes at the power imbalance inherent to oppressive political regimes, devoting special attention to the one in her homeland. Emerging from the second generation of feminist art, Kiani’s multidisciplinary practice is rooted in her own background, but its aim is, first and foremost, to encapsulate the collective experiences of thousands of Iranian people. 

Soli Kiani, TRAUMA 1 and 2, 2026, 300 x 210 cm each, wax crayon and acrylic on canvas. Photo Kunstdokumentation.com. Courtesy Contemporary Lynx

by Pola Folwarczny, Contemporary Lynx

The artist’s socio-critical commentary manifests itself through pieces that tangibly evoke the raw feelings and sensations they are meant to capture. Moving between installations, objects, photography and painting, she creates powerful expressions of the loss of control and freedom that so many experience. By bringing audiences closer to conditions of life that they often find unfamiliar, she forces Western society to at last turn its eye to the injustices of the surrounding world. Kiani undermines the seemingly inevitable, pushes at the limits of what’s deemed acceptable and creates resistance in form, material and content.

Work in Progress:

Koushna Navabi

Finishing new works for Frieze London that turn geological maps and found tree trunks into sites of metamorphosis, Koushna Navabi unravels the personal and political histories of her practice

Koushna Navabi's works in progress. Courtesy: the artist

‘For years I was terrified to make political work,’ says Koushna Navabi. For the Iran-born, London-based artist, acts of knitting, stitching and weaving were personal solace from the external horrors of the Iranian Revolution, from which she escaped as a teenager. Navabi was training as a ballet dancer in 1979 when her school shut down and she was forced to flee the country alone. ‘All I had was this bodily memory of dancing,’ she says, ‘and I think I carried that into my work.’  

Originally self-taught, Navabi moved to London in 1993 to complete an MA in Fine Art at Goldsmiths, University of London. She works across knitting, textiles, painting, sculpture and mixed media, often presenting multidisciplinary works alongside each other. These materials and processes carry different histories and associations with labour, the domestic, repetition, cultural heritage and transformation.   

Over the years, Navabi has developed a highly personal and intellectual approach, but the power of her work lies in its grey areas. To understand her work is to slowly unravel it. ‘I don’t want the work to be solely political; that’s just one of the layers.’  

As she completes two new works for Frieze London, presented as part of a group with Don Gallery, Navabi discusses transformation as a form of survival, her fascination with ancient mythology and her own process of metamorphosis. 

Interview by Izzy Bilkus, Frieze London

Izzy Bilkus Tell me about your new work for Frieze London. 

Koushna Navabi I’m exhibiting a painting and a sculpture. The painting is a section of the seismic map of the Persian Gulf, which I’ve painted to look like it’s knitted. The sculpture is an anthropomorphic figure made from found tree trunks, Persian kilim, stitches and polished bronze. These works bring craft and canon in the same breath. Both works sound quite different, but there’s a narrative of transformation that ties them together. 

Tehran artists respond to catastrophe — and refuse to surrender to it

The city’s inaugural art month is bringing creators, galleries and collectors together as Iranians grapple with the trauma of war and unrest

At the Artists House in downtown Tehran, Parisa Abbasi’s Repair depicts a human figure fallen apart, with fragments scattered across the floor. Courtesy Najmeh Bozorgmehr and FT.

by Najmeh Bozorgmehr in Tehran, FT

A blackened, cracked and scorched canvas hangs in Artibition Art Gallery in Tehran, its Persian inscriptions emerging through layers of soot and ash. Burnt-out candles sit before it, wax spilled across the floor.

The two-panel painting by Mojtaba Amini reflects his experience at the height of the war, when US and Israeli strikes hit Tehran’s fuel depots on March 7, sending a dark cloud over the capital, followed by toxic rainfall. The text reads: “A black chador has covered the city’s sky . . . a woman with a bottle of mineral water washes a blackened cat . . . how ominous the colour black is.” Yet Amini’s darkness is not without an exit. “I know this darkness will subside.”

The painting is part of immutable, a group exhibition and one of dozens of shows, open studios and cultural events taking place across Tehran until September 11 as part of Tehran Art Month, intended to promote the city’s visual arts. It is the first event to bring together so many of Tehran’s galleries at a time when Iranian society is grappling with the trauma of two wars in the past year and bloody unrest in January, in which thousands were killed.