Sculpture by Maryam Mazrooei

Location: Ioakimion Girls High School

15.11.2024 – 30.11.2024

It is our revolution. Women, Life Freedom, we rebel against the system. The revolution is a woman.

The artist endeavors to effectively process the immense experience of violence women face through her artistic abilities.“I’m constantly going through manic phases right now, where I have to paint, snap pics, write, jog around the block, or else I’ll drown.”

Maryam Mazrooei is an artist, writer, photographer, and journalist from Iran. She participated in the uprising “Women, Life, Freedom” in Iran and had to go to exile after detention. Women, their strength to survive and to keep their dignity is one focus of her work, deeply influenced by Persian Poetry.

As a senior editor on the political desk of a reformist news agency in Iran, she reported on pivotal moments in the region’s history, focusing on women’s rights and human resilience. She won first place for her essay on censorship in Iran. Her research book, Red Lines in Iran, and her two novels, The Common Lover and The Public Secret, are banned in Iran

.In 2020, Maryam Mazrooei was accepted into the prestigious Spéos photography program in Paris, but she was banned from leaving her home country after the government confiscated her passport. In 2022, during the Woman, Life, Freedom revolution in Iran,

She was arrested for participating in street protests and collaborating with The Guardian. This experience profoundly impacted her life, leading to her subsequent exile. After being released from prison, she moved to Istanbul and took an art residency. She was a lecturer at the ninth International General Art Assembly held in Turkey and exhibited at the USPD gallery. Since her exile, she has focused on painting, sculpting, and photography, showcasing her work at Depo Art Space. She is currently working on a long-term mixed-media project about women and nature and has illustrated children’s books.