Artist and filmmaker Maryam Tafakory joins us to present a selection of her celebrated short films, includes Irani Bag (2020), Nazarbazi (2022), Mast-del (2023), and a new work in progress. Working with found and archival footage, Tafakory uses layering and citation to reflect on intimacy and memory within the context of post-revolutionary Iranian cinema. Her essayistic collages unearth furtive glances and proxies for physical touch taken from a kaleidoscopic array of films made in Iran after 1979, when on-screen contact between men and women was prohibited; more recently, her work has transposed this archive with contemporary stories of desire and forbidden pleasure. Lyrical but bracing, Tafakory’s films offer a close reading of systems of erasure and give voice to the clandestine bonds and powerful modes of expression that persist within them.
This screening has been postponed to a future date.