Quotes by Shirin Neshat - Page 1

Nature has the most powerfully healing effect.
Shirin Neshat / Visual Artist
Effects
Healing
Most Powerful
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Art is our weapon. Culture is a form of resistance.
Shirin Neshat / Visual Artist
Art
Culture
Weapons
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Art is no crime. It's every artist's responsibility to make art that is meaningful
Shirin Neshat / Visual Artist
Art
Smile
Crime
Meaningful
Responsibility
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Every Iranian artist dreams of the black market. We don't care about making money.
Shirin Neshat / Visual Artist
Don't Care
Iranian
Making Money
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In this Western world that we have, culture risks being [only] a form of entertainment.
Shirin Neshat / Visual Artist
Culture
Risk
World
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Being political is an integral part of being Iranian. Our lives are defined by politics.
Shirin Neshat / Visual Artist
Defined
Iranian
Our Lives
Political
Integral
Integral Part
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I find that through the study of women, you get to the heart - the truth - of the culture.
Shirin Neshat / Visual Artist
Culture
Heart
Study
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Every Iranian artist, in one form or another, is political. Politics have defined our lives.
Shirin Neshat / Visual Artist
Artist
Inspiration
Motivation
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There is nothing negative about a group of people crying out for democracy - and if my voice counts, I will be vocal.
Shirin Neshat / Visual Artist
Negative
Vocal
Counts
Crying
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Poets use metaphors and symbolism to construct images. I construct my images in the same way, except that I am using a different form.
Shirin Neshat / Visual Artist
Different
Symbolism
Use
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I believe we don't need to widen the divide between the West and Islam. Rather, we need to build dialogue to encourage tolerance and respect.
Shirin Neshat / Visual Artist
Respect
Dialogue
Islam
Tolerance
West
Build
Respect Believe I Believe
Between
Divide
Rather
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My mother is my last point of security in relation to my past, and if that breaks, I will not ever have that type of pure love or pure attachment.
Shirin Neshat / Visual Artist
Attachment
Mother
Past
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To me, editing is not something you can do in a rush because the artists themselves are not always their own best editors. Time is absolutely everything.
Shirin Neshat / Visual Artist
Artist
Editing
Editors
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I really am a strong believer that with editing, it should take a long time. Even you yourself are not capable of making the right decisions; sometimes you need a distance.
Shirin Neshat / Visual Artist
Distance
Editing
Strong
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My father was a doctor, but he was what I would call an intellectual - very well-read and very interested in knowledge. He insisted that I get as much education as my brothers.
Shirin Neshat / Visual Artist
Intellectual
Doctor
Brothers
Insisted
Well-Read
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Beautiful woman wrapped in chadors, with huge machine guns in their hands. Brilliant, shocking, amazingly contradictory images. They compelled me to deeply investigate these ideas.
Shirin Neshat / Visual Artist
Beautiful
Gun
Hands
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My work has never been autobiographical. Although the subjects are driven on a personal perspective it's sort of elevated above me. I try to express something that is more a collective expression of crisis.
Shirin Neshat / Visual Artist
Expression
Perspective
Trying
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There's something when you're always immersed in the natural landscape where it becomes your healer, in a way, at the same time that it also becomes sort of frightening. I guess that's how I see things, in that form of duality.
Shirin Neshat / Visual Artist
Landscape
Natural
Way
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I believe and support the feminist movement, but I am not generally interested in considering women's rights in relation to equality with men, or in a competition with men, but rather within their own rights and feminine space.
Shirin Neshat / Visual Artist
Equality
Women
Space
Competition
Considering
Feminine
Movement
Relation
Rights
Support
Men Women Equality
Within
Own
Interested
Generally
Rather
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I think of myself, an Iranian/American artist, and wonder what would I want if I'm ever imprisoned by the Iranian government for the work that I make? I answer: I would hope that the United States government comes to my rescue.
Shirin Neshat / Visual Artist
Iranian
Rescue
United States Government
Wonder
Imprisoned
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Part of me has always resisted the Western clichéd image of Muslim women, depicting them as nothing more than silent victims. My art, without denying 'repression,' is a testimony to unspoken female power and the continuing protest in Islamic culture.
Shirin Neshat / Visual Artist
Art
Power
Women
Islamic
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I'm really interested in social justice, and if an artist has a certain power of being heard and voicing something important, it's right to do it. It could still be done in such a way that it's not aggressive or overly didactic. I'm trying to find that form.
Shirin Neshat / Visual Artist
Aggressive
Artist
Certain
Didactic
Form
Heard
Important
Justice
Social Justice
Interested
Overly
Such A Way
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I think every one of us dreams, and we know what the quality of a dream is. In many ways, the reason dreams are so - mine are a little bit nightmarish, is that it's when you're really naked and can really face the things you don't face in reality, your darkest anxieties.
Shirin Neshat / Visual Artist
Dream
Reality
Thinking
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Magical realism allows an artist like myself to inject layers of meaning without being obvious. In American culture, where there is freedom of expression, this approach may seem forced, unnecessary and misunderstood. But this system of communication has become very Iranian.
Shirin Neshat / Visual Artist
Communication
American Culture
Approach
Artist
Freedom Of Expression
Iranian
Layers
Magic Realism
Obvious
Realism
Unnecessary
Forced
Magical
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Those of us living in the state of in between have certain advantages and disadvantages. The advantage of being exposed to a new culture and in my case the freedom that comes with living in the USA. The disadvantages of course being that you will never experience again being a center or quite home anywhere.
Shirin Neshat / Visual Artist
Home
Culture
Usa
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The idea of feeling displaced, and never feeling safe anywhere in the world, where you always feel like you're safer if you're over there, is not just my experience. If you went to Iran today or an Iranian came to America today, or the fact that there are bombs exploding everywhere, there's just a tremendous sense of fear and feeling a desire for security.
Shirin Neshat / Visual Artist
America
Ideas
Iran
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You're faced with creation, you're faced with something very mysterious and very mystical, whether it's looking at the ocean or being alone in a forest, or sometimes looking at the stars. There's really something very powerful about nature that's endlessly mysterious and a reminder of our humanity, our mortality, of more existential things that we usually manage to not get involved with very often because of daily activity.
Shirin Neshat / Visual Artist
Ocean
Powerful
Stars
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We're either awake or we're sleeping. During the time that we're awake, we work very hard at denying things, mainly because we have to function as people. We have to control and repress everything that we're fearful of, because it doesn't make sense to go crazy on the streets, but in reality we hide and we hide, repress and repress, our fears of the world of violence, of separation, of death, and sometimes hopes, and some things that are very joyful, reunions or all of those good things. It's only in dreams that we're really truthful with whatever hurts most; they're really very real.
Shirin Neshat / Visual Artist
Dream
Crazy
Hurt
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