MITRA TABRIZIAN

Born in Tehran, Iran, currently live and works in London, Mitra Tabrizian’s work is concerned with what we might call the ‘crisis of contemporary culture’; from the recent financial collapse in the West, to the shifting realities of life in post-revolutionary Iran in the East.

The exhibition in Milan comprises photographs that represent Mitra Tabrizian’s artistic quest from 2000 up to the present time. Combining documentary techniques with those of film, and often focusing on ordinary people, she makes elaborate, meticulously staged photographic tableaux containing condensed narratives

The series Border 2005 -2006 aim to reproduce the statelessness feeling of living ‘in between’ of Iranians in exile: at first sight the photographs appear to have been taken in Iran whereas they are actually shot in Uk.

Tehran 2006, focuses on the reality of everyday life and the ordinary in extraordinary times. All the characters ‘play’ themselves: the crowd is a mixture of people who are struggling and living on the edge; a taxi driver, factory worker, builder, cleaner, dress-maker, servant etc..

The series Beyond the Limits, 2000- 2001 (also the title of the first monograph on Mitra Tabrizian published in 2004) is a mise en scène of an imminent disaster in which an apparently perfect society is unmasked to reveal the anxiety behind the illusion, and the violence of survival within corporate culture

Shot at the headquarters of JP Morgan and depicting actual bankers, City, London 2008 alludes to the current economic crisis – an image chosen for the cover of the catalogue of the major exhibition;  “21st Century: Art in the first decade” at the Queensland Art Gallery / Gallery of Modern Art, Australia.  In Silent Majority 2001 - 2002, candid-camera shots at Canary Wharf station in the City of London, taken without anyone noticing, everyone too caught up in the pace of modern life!