Fusing elements of Persian architecture with Christian altarpieces, Arghavan Khosravi grapples with the structures and ideological strictures that shape our lives. The Iranian artist has long reckoned with women’s fight for equality, particularly amid censorship and religious dogma in her native country. Through vibrant gradients that radiate across her sculptural paintings, Khosravi entices the viewer into urgent, ongoing conversations about resistance and control.
Opening today at Uffner & Liu, What Remains presents a dynamic new body of work that captures moments of tension and strife. Figures, in Khosravi’s works, are often restricted and tethered to domestic objects and space, and critically, physically separated from one another. Complete with hinged shutters, suspended cords, and tiny visages tucked into unassuming openings, these new pieces incorporate women obscured by their surroundings, leaving only fragments of a limb or face visible.
While altarpieces have historically been utilized to share stories of the divine through visual depictions, Khosravi instead turns inward. She lives and works in Stamford, Connecticut, and her homesickness and longing for a changed Iran are strong. Large-scale works like “Bearing” portray a seated woman buttressing a Persian building, thick, black, oil-like liquid seeping from its foundation.
What Remains was already in progress before the U.S. war against Iran, the gallery shares. The works are therefore not in response to this particular conflict but rather a timely acknowledgment of what it means to live in a region continually in crisis. As always, Khosravi reminds us that even amid chaos, destruction, and government overreach that outlasts any singular emergency, beauty and self-empowerment can still trigger a new paradigm.
What Remains runs through July 2 in New York. Explore more of the artist’s politically attuned works on Instagram.
