Self-portrait as collective art praxis. 

A visual reinterpretation of women’s performative presentation during the Jina Uprising in Iran

Kheyzaran Esmaeilzade is a researcher and lecturer at the University of Guilan in Iran. She has written and critiqued for art journals in Iran for many years. She currently holds an early postdoctoral position in the Media Studies Department at Ruhr University, under the mentorship of Prof. Dr. Henriette Gunkel and Dr. Roman Seidel. Over the last decade, she has explored the relationship between art and politics, Iran’s 20th-century art history, Iranian contemporary art, the intersectional relationship between art, society, gender, media, art theory, feminism, art practices by non-artists, and art activism.

In her talk, she aims to engage with and interpret the visual aspects of the Jina (Woman, Life, Freedom / Zan, Zendegi, Azadi) uprising in Iran, focusing on the performative images that women have created and presented of themselves throughout this movement. Her presentation will propose a visual narrative of the Jina uprising as part of Iranian women’s enduring struggle against injustice and discrimination. Throughout this narrative, a categorization of the various strategies women use to performatively formalize their bodies is developed, leading to an interpretation of how these images can be viewed as self-portraits and artistic practices.