Sanaz Mazinani

Sanaz Mazinani
Born 1978 (age 37–38)
Tehran, Iran
Nationality Iranian Canadian
Education OCAD University,
Stanford University
Known for Visual art, installation art, photography
Notable work Site, Sight, and Insight,
Frames of the Visible,
Conference of the Birds,
Room for Disruption,
Celebrating Bay Area Activism,
Iran Revisited,
When We Start to Love War
Movement Contemporary Art
Awards Canada Council for the Arts (2013),
SF Arts Commission (2013),
Kala Art Institute Fellowship (2012)
Website sanazmazinani.com

Sanaz Mazinani (born 1978) is an Iranian–Canadian multidisciplinary visual artist, curator and educator, she is known for her photography and installation art. She is currently based in San Francisco and Toronto.

Biography

Early life

Mazinani was born in Tehran, Iran in 1978 just one year prior to the Iranian Revolution.[1][2] She immigrated to Canada at the age of 11.[1] While in Canada Mazinani studied at the Ontario College of Art & Design, currently OCAD University, where she graduated in 2003. She later moved to the United States in 2009. She received her Masters in Fine Arts at Stanford University in 2011.[3]

Art work

Throughout her practice Sanaz Mazinani has produced an interconnected body of work. From the early stages Mazinani has been concerned with two different but connected aspects of the image; the construction of images, and our mediated notion of the world through the constructed image. A Study in the Vertical (2002–2003) is an example of an early attempt at understanding the medium of photography and the production of images. In this work without the use of a negative she exposes the photographic colour paper to light using an enlarger in the darkroom. The results are camera-less abstract images without referents. In her later bodies of work Mazinani has continued asking the viewer to consider how the image is made and represented.

Mazinani's sensibility towards war, how we come to understand conflict and its politics through images and media has resulted in numerous works where she uses pre-existing, archival, and found images to digitally produce abstractions that without attentive observation would appear as ornamentations seen in Islamic art and architecture. Room for Disruption (2011) is an installation made of various components and not limited to the printed photograph; incorporating video, wallpaper, and sculptural elements mixed with images. She creates wall mounted photographic sculptures that protrude and in turn bend our field of vision. These structures usually provide both a central point inviting the audience to look closer, and an expanding geometric field that requires engagement from afar. Making visual juxtapositions, Mazinani challenges the viewer to look at photographs differently. This is best exemplified in Frames of the Visible (2011–2013) produced entirely by images gathered from online media sources. These works often collocate images from opposing political poles in an attempt to question our understanding of conflict, military censorship, circulation and proliferation of information. For instance, when observing one of the pieces from a distance it is physically reminiscent of an aircraft and at the same time that of an Islamic ornamentation.[4] Once looked at closely one realizes that it is a constellation of two images mirrored, cropped, and repeated in various orientations; a propaganda image of an armed Muslim woman with Hamas banners placed beside an image of a U.S.A. military pilot inspecting a fighter jet.

Mazinani's structuralist approach can be seen as an attempt to scrutinize media by subverting how one perceives images. As characterized in When We Start to Love War (2010), many of her works borrow images that have been filtered through Western sources, but nevertheless are all symptomatic of the East-West dichotomy. Through this methodological approach Mazinani's installations speak back to the dizzying politics behind the global use/abuse of the instrumental visual language of images and simultaneously enable the viewer to be a part of this dialogue.[5]

Notable projects include: Bay Area Activism, 2013;[6] Site, Sight, and Insight, 2013;[7] Conference of the Birds, 2012;[8][9] Frames of the Visible, 2011–2013;[10] Room for Disruption, 2011; When We Start to Love War, 2010; Iran Revisited, 1999–2013.[11][12][13]

Exhibitions

Mazinani's art works have been included in numerous exhibitions throughout North America, Europe and Asia. Notable group exhibitions include Twisted Sisters: Reimagining Urban Portraiture at the Museum Bärengasse, Zurich, Switzerland and San Francisco City Hall. Organized by the San Francisco Arts Commission and curated by Alexandra Blättler and San Francisco Arts Commission Gallery Director, Meg Shiffler;[14] Magic of Persia Contemporary Art Prize 2013 Exhibition at the Emirates Financial Towers in Dubai, UAE;[15] Sarai Reader 09 Festival, New Delhi, India[16] Border Cultures, curated by Srimoyee Mitra at the Art Gallery of Windsor, Windsor, Canada, which won the Ontario Association of Art Galleries exhibit of the year award;[17][18] Shadow Puppets: Traces of New Documentary Practices at the Welch School Galleries, curated by Jill Frank and Stephanie Dowda for the Georgia State University;[19] and Occupy Bay Area, at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in San Francisco, CA.[20]

Significant solo exhibitions include: Sight, Site, and Insight at Gallery 44 Center for Contemporary Photography in 2013 which was accompanied by an exhibition catalogue written by Rosemary Heather;[5] Celebrating Bay Area Activism, a series of six photo-collage works installed in 36 bus kiosks along Market Street in San Francisco, as part of the SFAC Art on Market Street Public Art program;[21] and Frames of the Visible in 2012 at Stephen Bulger Gallery, as a featured exhibition in the Scotiabank CONTACT Photography Festival.[22]

Recognition

Mazinani has been awarded grants from the Canada Council (2013), the San Francisco Arts Commission Cultural Equity Grant (2013),[23] as well as awards from Stanford University, Ontario Arts Council, and the Toronto Arts Council for the development and creation of her projects. Mazinani was named a 2012 Kala Art Institute Fellow.[24] She was awarded the SFAC Art on Market Street commission for the project Celebrating Bay Area Activism.[25]

Curation

Mazinani's recent curatorial projects included three exhibitions created for the Tirgan biennial festival in Toronto in 2013.[26] These included Made in China, an outdoor art installation by Tehran-based artist Negar Farajiani,[27] Hope Echoed, an exhibition of portraits of Iranian women by Toronto's lively arts community,[28] and The Third Space, a three-month exhibition featuring works by six Iranian artists held at the York Quay Gallery in Toronto's Harbourfront Center[29] The exhibition focused on the hybrid identities that result from life in the diaspora and received much acclaim.[30]

Other curatorial projects have included, Visions of Eternity (2011), including works by Abbas Akhavan, Reza Derakshani, Parastou Forouhar, Oldouz Moslemian, Taimaz Moslemian, Nasser Ovissi, Hamed Sahihi, Soody Sharifi, and Ali Soltani;[31] New Constellations: Contemporary Iranian Video Art, with colleague Amirali Ghasemi;[32] and Off World, an interactive site-specific outdoor installation with Andrew Mallis and Mateo Guez.

References

  1. 1 2 Whiting, Sam (September 5, 2013). "S.F. bus stop art takes us back in history". San Francisco Chronicle. Retrieved 2014-06-10.
  2. ↑ Curiel, Jonathan (November 6, 2013). "Infinite Regress: Two Iranian Artists Multiply Their Spiritual Images". SF Weekly.
  3. ↑ "Sanaz Mazinani, Department of Art & Art History". Stanford University. 2015. Retrieved 2015-04-15.
  4. ↑ ""Frames of the Visible" Exhibition Press Release". Stephen Bulger Gallery. June 9, 2012. Retrieved 2014-06-10.
  5. 1 2 "Site, Sight, and Insight". Gallery 44. Retrieved 2014-06-10.
  6. ↑ "Sanaz Mazinani". Art on Market St. Retrieved 2014-06-10.
  7. ↑ "Site, Sight, and Insight". Gallery 44. Retrieved 2014-06-10.
  8. ↑ Garcia, Nancy (May 13, 2014). "Arab Spring and Occupy Oakland Fuse in Sanaz Mazinani's "Conference of the Birds"". 7x7.
  9. ↑ Lau, Charlene K. (May 10, 2012). "Public: Big Ambitions". Canadian Art. Retrieved 2014-06-10.
  10. ↑ "Sanaz Mazinani: Frames of the Visible". Taymour Grahne Gallery. Retrieved June 10, 2014.
  11. ↑ "Sanaz Mazinani". En Foco. Retrieved 2014-06-10.
  12. ↑ Magdaleno, Johnny (April 17, 2014). "Sanaz Mazinani Warps War Photography into Kaleidoscopic Collages". The Creators Project.
  13. ↑ "Uncovering the Many Faces of Iran: Sanaz Mazinani". Border Crossings (108). December 2008.
  14. ↑ "TWISTED SISTERS: Reimaging Urban Portraiture | SFAC Galleries". Sfartscommission.org. May 13, 2013. Retrieved 2014-06-10.
  15. ↑ "Magic of Persia – Contemporary Art Prize – Shortlist 2013 – Artists". Mopcap.com. October 7, 2012. Retrieved 2014-06-10.
  16. ↑ "s a r a i". s a r a i. Retrieved 2014-06-10.
  17. ↑ "Border Cultures – Art Gallery of Windsor". agw.ca. Retrieved 2014-06-24.
  18. ↑ "AGW's Mitra wins provincial accolades". windsorstar.com. Retrieved 2014-06-24.
  19. ↑ Art+Design. "Review: Through lens of war, GSU’s "Shadow Puppets" expands meaning of "documentary"". ArtsATL. Retrieved 2014-06-10.
  20. ↑ "Occupy Bay Area". YBCA. Retrieved 2014-06-10.
  21. ↑ Wiener, Anna (October 17, 2013). "Sanaz Mazinani, In Between: The Art of Diaspora". Medium.
  22. ↑ CONTACT photography festival. "Scotiabank CONTACT Photography FestivalFrames of the Visible". 2012.scotiabankcontactphoto.com. Retrieved 2014-06-10.
  23. ↑ "Cultural Equity Grants FY 2012–2013" (PDF). sfartscommission.org. Retrieved 2014-06-24.
  24. ↑ "Residency & Fellowship Awards: Stella Ebner". Kala Art Institute. Retrieved 2014-06-10.
  25. ↑ "New Art on Market Street Poster Series Celebrates 50 Years of Bay Area Activism | Public Art & Civic Art Collection". San Francisco Arts Commission. July 3, 2013. Retrieved 2014-06-10.
  26. ↑ "Sanaz Mazinani (Curator) | Tirgan". Tirgan.ca. Retrieved 2014-06-10.
  27. ↑ Visual Arts. "Negar Farajiani: Made in China". Tirgan. Retrieved 2014-06-10.
  28. ↑ Visual Arts. "Hope Echoed". Tirgan. Retrieved 2014-06-10.
  29. ↑ "The Third Space | Visual Arts". Harbourfront Centre. September 15, 2013. Retrieved 2014-06-10.
  30. ↑ "WRITTEN ON THE BODY/ POLITICS OF POETRY: Iranian Artists & the Power of Script Pt 1". Mixed Bag Mag. July 17, 2013. Retrieved 2014-06-10.
  31. ↑ "Tirgan: Visions of Eternity". harbourfrontcentre.com. Retrieved 2014-06-24.
  32. ↑ "New Constellations: 1st Screening of Contemporary Iranian Video Art in LA at the IAAB Conference". payvand.com. October 11, 2012. Retrieved 2014-06-24.

External links

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