Hoda Afshar, Unflinching Photo Artist, to Show at AGNSW

Hoda Afshar, Untitled #7 from the series 'Behold' (2016). Pigment photographic print. 85 x 120 cm. Courtesy Hoda Afshar.

By Sam Gaskin – 16 June 2023, Sydney

Hoda Afshar b. 1983, Iran Follow +

The Art Gallery of New South Wales (AGNSW) today announced that it will present a Hoda Afshar solo exhibition from 2 September 2023 to 21 January 2024.

Hoda Afshar: A Curve is a Broken Line will feature the Melbourne-based artist’s photographs and videos from the past decade, including a newly commissioned series.

One of the best-known works in the exhibition is Behrouz Boochani – Manus Island (2018) from the series ‘Remain’ (2018). The video and photo portraits were taken on an island in Papua New Guinea where Australia processed asylum seekers from 2001 to 2017, cutting off all support for those who remained in 2021.

Hoda Afshar Behrouz Boochani – Manus Island, from the series ‘Remain’ (2018). Pigment photographic print. 130 x 104 cm. Art Gallery of New South Wales, purchased with funds provided by the Contemporary Collection Benefactors 2020. Courtesy Hoda Afshar. Photo: © Art Gallery of New South Wales.

Speaking to Ocula Magazine in February, Afshar said, ‘As an individual and as an Iranian woman, a lot of the struggles I had when I migrated to Australia were struggles with the image—images that come out of my country or are shared with the world.’

‘I have to constantly fight against those images and justify my being against the images that exist in the mind of society,’ she said.

‘Hoda Afshar is one of the most exciting artists working in Australia today,’ said AGNSW director Michael Brand.

Hoda Afshar, Untitled #2, from the series ‘Speak the Wind’ (2015–22). Pigment photographic print. 100 x 80 cm. Courtesy Hoda Afshar.

‘While her work explores themes of violence and pain, it also speaks to the transformative potential of image-making which is of profound importance to art institutions, as agents of advocacy and emotional encounter,’ he said.

The exhibition’s curator, Isobel Parker Philip, said, ‘Hoda Afshar’s work is both deeply researched and poetically resonant and can be seen as a form of activism as much as an artistic inquiry.’

‘Hoda’s photographs and videos are emotionally embroiled in the world they depict. It is this fact that makes a survey of her work both compelling and timely,’ she added. —[O]

Main image: Hoda Afshar, Untitled #7 from the series 'Behold' (2016). Pigment photographic print. 85 x 120 cm. Courtesy Hoda Afshar.

Sam Gaskin Sam Gaskin has covered contemporary art for over a decade, mostly from Shanghai, China.