Every artist depicts one subject and my role is to depict alienation of women in this world.” 

Sara Rahanjam

Sara Rahanjam’s exhibition is a rich collection of visual metaphors touching on one of the most palpable social phenomena of our time: Alienation of women. Estrangement is an unfortunate feature of life. It is best described by Camus as the “gentle indifference of the world.” where one is tolerated, but never fully acknowledged. In this sense women are constantly reminded of their unwelcome presence in that they feel like strangers in everyday environment. Tolerated, but never fully acknowledged. Forough describes this estrangement.

روزها رفتند و من دیگر

خود نمی دانم کدامینم

آن من سرسخت مغرورم

یا من مغلوب دیرینم

And she finds the thought of this lasting any longer suffocating to the point where she refuses even to think about it: 

فکر آینده خفه ام می کند 

اما بگذریم بگذریم

In our society this sense of estrangement is particularly acute among women. According to the artist,“The weight of this historical, social, religious and political phenomenon is so alienating that it can drive one to the verge of madness.” Take a look around and you’ll note that every woman viscerally feels the devastating effects of this estrangement. One can only surmise that the more conscious, the deeper one’s understanding and sense of alienation and the more profound one’s pain. This pain should be taken seriously. The Argentinian poet Borges ruminates:

If only Death, that other waking up

would grant me a time free of all memory

of my own name and all that I have been!

Vahshi Bafghi goes further:

طبیبم گفت درمانی ندارد درد مهجوری

  
غلط می‌گفت خود را کشتم و درمان خود کردم

Sara’s preoccupation with alienation is not new. Her expression, however, is unique and quite refreshing.

The exhibition of the collection of works by Sara Rahanjam helps one relate to that alienation through powerful visual metaphors. More importantly it offers a ray of hope in a bleak world.

The show features meticulously rendered sculptures of fantastical creatures with the torso of a woman and the head of a rooster, along with a few other real and surreal objects such as a realistic rooster or one with human hands replacing a rooster’s back half. Altogether the collection of anthropomorphic and androgynous sculptures along with realistic and surreal objects add to the richness of the collection. Initially these sculptures evoke the Centaur, mythical half man-half horse creature of Greek mythology or the Mermaid. But the similarity ends there. Sara’s is an exploration of gender dynamics. It’s a cry for understanding and engagement. Not just men understanding women but also the other way around. Sara is not fighting, confronting or abandoning men, but reaching out, to understand and to be understood. Men and women need one another. We have to live, work and enjoy this “risky and beautiful game of life” together. The hands jutting out of the body of half rooster is reaching out. The rooster sporting the body of a woman and the woman with the head of rooster is a utopia of androgyny where one could take a break from the present day predicament excused by gender. This exhibition reminds on of the stories of kelileh va damneh which were human stories with animals as actors. Albeit with an added twist. To boot, the fastidious rendition of these objects, always a hallmark of Sara’s works, leaves no room for distraction. 

Without losing sight of the grim realities of life, I would like to finish with a poem by the American poet Tony Hoagland that would best capture my visceral reaction to Sara Rahanjam’s current exhibition.

…It is autumn here.

The defoliated trees look frightened

at the edge of town,

as if the train they missed

had taken all their clothes.

The whole world in unison is turning

toward a zone of nakedness and cold.

 But me, I have this strange conviction

that I am going to be born. Every artist depicts one subject and my role is to depict alienation of women in this world.” 

Sara Rahanjam

Sara Rahanjam’s exhibition is a rich collection of visual metaphors touching on one of the most palpable social phenomena of our time: Alienation of women. Estrangement is an unfortunate feature of life. It is best described by Camus as the “gentle indifference of the world.” where one is tolerated, but never fully acknowledged. In this sense women are constantly reminded of their unwelcome presence in that they feel like strangers in everyday environment. Tolerated, but never fully acknowledged. Forough describes this estrangement.

روزها رفتند و من دیگر

خود نمی دانم کدامینم

آن من سرسخت مغرورم

یا من مغلوب دیرینم

And she finds the thought of this lasting any longer suffocating to the point where she refuses even to think about it: 

فکر آینده خفه ام می کند 

اما بگذریم بگذریم

In our society this sense of estrangement is particularly acute among women. According to the artist,“The weight of this historical, social, religious and political phenomenon is so alienating that it can drive one to the verge of madness.” Take a look around and you’ll note that every woman viscerally feels the devastating effects of this estrangement. One can only surmise that the more conscious, the deeper one’s understanding and sense of alienation and the more profound one’s pain. This pain should be taken seriously. The Argentinian poet Borges ruminates:

If only Death, that other waking up

would grant me a time free of all memory

of my own name and all that I have been!

Vahshi Bafghi goes further:

طبیبم گفت درمانی ندارد درد مهجوری

  
غلط می‌گفت خود را کشتم و درمان خود کردم

Sara’s preoccupation with alienation is not new. Her expression, however, is unique and quite refreshing.

The exhibition of the collection of works by Sara Rahanjam helps one relate to that alienation through powerful visual metaphors. More importantly it offers a ray of hope in a bleak world.

The show features meticulously rendered sculptures of fantastical creatures with the torso of a woman and the head of a rooster, along with a few other real and surreal objects such as a realistic rooster or one with human hands replacing a rooster’s back half. Altogether the collection of anthropomorphic and androgynous sculptures along with realistic and surreal objects add to the richness of the collection. Initially these sculptures evoke the Centaur, mythical half man-half horse creature of Greek mythology or the Mermaid. But the similarity ends there. Sara’s is an exploration of gender dynamics. It’s a cry for understanding and engagement. Not just men understanding women but also the other way around. Sara is not fighting, confronting or abandoning men, but reaching out, to understand and to be understood. Men and women need one another. We have to live, work and enjoy this “risky and beautiful game of life” together. The hands jutting out of the body of half rooster is reaching out. The rooster sporting the body of a woman and the woman with the head of rooster is a utopia of androgyny where one could take a break from the present day predicament excused by gender. This exhibition reminds on of the stories of kelileh va damneh which were human stories with animals as actors. Albeit with an added twist. To boot, the fastidious rendition of these objects, always a hallmark of Sara’s works, leaves no room for distraction. 

Without losing sight of the grim realities of life, I would like to finish with a poem by the American poet Tony Hoagland that would best capture my visceral reaction to Sara Rahanjam’s current exhibition.

…It is autumn here.

The defoliated trees look frightened

at the edge of town,

as if the train they missed

had taken all their clothes.

The whole world in unison is turning

toward a zone of nakedness and cold.

 But me, I have this strange conviction

that I am going to be born.

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