When Ayatollah Khomeini’s theocratic regime took power in Iran 43 years ago, film-maker Kobra Saeedi wouldn’t toe the line. She took part in a protest on International Women’s Day 1979 against the introduction of compulsory hijab – and brought her camera. She was jailed, confined for years in mental institutions, then released into poverty and homelessness.
In Soheila Sokhanvari’s painting Kobra, we see her in her stellar prime, hair uncovered like all the 31 creative, rebellious women of pre-1979 Iran portrayed in this show, a cigarette between her red varnished nails as she looks quizzically out of the painting. As protests against head coverings are again shaking Iran, there’s a disturbing deja vu to discovering what was done to this defiant woman. The death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini after she was arrested by the Gasht-e Ershad morality police has led to spontaneous demonstrations including school girls giving the middle finger to the image of Khomeini. The women in this exhibition, some of whom died long before the rise of religious rule, now look like the grandmothers of this revolt.
