Education
Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, Maine, United States, June-August 2019
PhD Researcher, Center For Interdisciplinary Studies in Society and Culture, Concordia University, Montréal, 2017- 2024
MFA, School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, 2012-2014
BFA (honors), University of Tehran College of Fine Arts, Tehran, Iran, 2007-2011
Awards and Fellowships
Fonds de Recherche du Québec Société et Culture (FRQSC), Research-Creation Post-Doctoral Fellowship (deferred), 2024-2026
Mitacs Globalink Research Award (GRA), Visiting Researcher Award, University of Warwick, Summer 2022
Iran International Documentary Film Festival Cinema Vérité, Mid-length International Competition Main Award: “One Image, Two Acts,” Tehran, December 16th, 2021
30__70 International Documentary Film Festival, Main Jury Prize: “One Image, Two Acts,” Italy, November 2021
Valdivia International Film Festival, International Competition Special Jury Mention: “One Image, Two Acts,” Chile, Oct 17th, 2021
VIDEOEX International Experimental Film and Video Festival, Honorable Mention International Feature Film Competition: “One Image, Two Acts,” Zurich, Switzerland, October 10th, 2021
IndieLisboa International Film Festival, Silvestre Section Best Short Film Award: “One Image, Two Acts,” Lisbon, Portugal, September 6th, 2021
Mimesis Documentary Festival, Jury Award for Best Short Documentary: “One Image, Two Acts,” Mimesis Center for Ethnographic and Documentary Art, August 9th, United States, 2021
59th Ann Arbor Film Festival, Winner of Juror’s Award: “One Image, Two Acts”, March 28th, United States, 2021
Fonds de Recherche du Québec Société et Culture (FRQSC), Doctoral Fellowship (Ranked 1st in Visual Arts Committee), 2021-2023
Concordia International and and Ministère de l'Éducation et de l'Enseignement supérieur, Québec Student Mobility Award, 2020-2021
La Bourse Plein sud 2019 (Long list nominated), Plein sud, centre d'exposition, Montréal, 2019
Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture Fellowship, Maine, United States, June-August 2019
Concordia International and Ministère de l'Éducation et de l'Enseignement supérieur, Graduate Student Mobility Award, 2018
Concordia University, Team Start-up Program (with Sima Kokotovic and Giuseppe Fidotta), 2018-2019
Concordia University, Travel Grant from the Ethnocultural Art Histories (EAHR) Research Chair, 2018
Concordia University, School of Graduate Studies Travel and Exposition Award, 2017-2023
Concordia University, Faculty of Arts and Science Graduate Doctoral Fellowship, 2017-2020
Concordia University, International Student Excellence Tuition Award, 2017-2020
Concordia University, Dean of Faculty of Arts and Science Award of Excellence, 2017-2018
Soma Summer School, Partial tuition scholarship, DF, México, 2017
FIVA 06: Festival Internacional de Video Arte, First Prize for Short Film, Buenos Aires, Argentina, Nov 2016
Est-Nord-Est, Pépinières européennes pour jeunes artistes, Québec, 2016
Vermont Studio Center, Full Fellowship Award, United States, 2015
School of the Art Institute of Chicago, James Nelson Raymond Fellowship, 2014
School of the Art Institute of Chicago, New Artist Society Merit Scholarship, 2012-2014
Artist and Research Residencies
Akademie der Künste der Welt (ADKDW), Artist-in-Residence, Cologne, Nov-Dec 2023
RAW Académie Session 9: Infrastructure Fellowship in collaboration with the Institute of Contemporary Art Philadelphia, March-April 2022
Haus der Kulturen der Welt (HKW): The Whole life Academy Participant, Berlin, Germany 2021-2022
Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, June-August 2019
Forum Transregionale Studien Berlin, Transregional Academy Fellowship at the American University of Beirut, August- Sep 2019
Illinois State University, Long Term Visiting Artist in Residence, Spring 2019
La Bande Vidéo, Production Residency, Québec City, Sep 2018
ZK/U Center for Arts and Urbanistics, supported by the Graduate Student Mobility Award, Berlin, June-July 2018
2nd International School of Filmic and Visual Sociology, University of Genoa, Italy, June 2018
SOMA Summer School, México, DF, July-August 2017
Est-Nord-Est résidence d'artistes (with highest fellowship), Saint-Jean-Port-Joli, Québec, May-July 2016
Vermont Studio Center, United States, Jan 2015
Chicago Artist Coalition Bolt Program, Chicago, 2014-2015
Ragdale Foundation, Lake Forest, United States, Sep 2014
ACRE Projects, Wisconsin, United States, July 2014
(Select) Solo Exhibitions
Extraction Out of Frame, VOX Centre de l'image contemporaine, Montréal, Jan-March, 2023
Hiding in Plain Sight: Archives of Oil, Centre Clark, Montréal, Canada, Oct -Nov 2021
Spatial Agreements, Chicago Artist Coalition, Chicago, IL, 2015
(Selected) Group Exhibitions | Festivals
(upcoming) UnionDocs, Artistic Differences in conversation with Cíntia Gil, New York, December 7, 2024
(upcoming) Asian Art Biennial Film Program, Curated by Merv Espina and Asli Seven, National Museum of Fine Arts Taiwan, 2024-2025
(recent) La lumiere collective, screening as part of the research project “du politique dans l’usage des archives filmiques,” Nov 26, 2024
(recent) Kunsthaus Graz, Screening as part of the conference: Entanglements. The Politics of Aesthetics and Retelling of Modernisms and Modern Arts, Austria, Nov 16, 2024
(on view) Jackman Humanities Institute University of Toronto, “Morphing Land, Impalpable Currents,” Curated by Yantong Li, September 2024-June 2025
(recent) Official Selection: Scenes of Extraction, Doclisboa Film Festival, Oct 17-27 2024
(recent) Cornell Cinema, Cornell University, October 29, 2024
(recent) NYU Abu Dhabi, Screening as part of the conference: Material and Visual Worlds of Oil Infrastructure in Histories of the Global South, Abu Dhabi, Oct 23, 2024
“Complicit Images,” (film tour) Curated by Maia Gusberti and Olena Newkryta, Kino Rex, Switzerland, 18-19 October 2024
Screening Rights Film Festival, Railroads and colonial infrastructures in South Caucasus and Iran, Coventry Transport Museum, October 18, 2024
Filmhaus Cologne, Undoing Images, Programmed by Ala Younis, Cologne, September 26, 2024
Shapeshifting Film Festival, Archival Shifts: Rewinding and Resuming History, Curated by Nafis Fathollahzadeh, Berlin, Sep 9, 2024
Oakville Galleries, Sunset Kino Film Program, Curated by Faisal Anwar & Tazeen Qayyum, July 4, 2024
11th Biennale nationale de sculpture contemporaine, Trois-Rivières, Québec, June-Sep 2024
“Complicit Images,” Screening program, Curated by Mia Gusberti and Olena Newkryta, Medienwerkstatt Wien, Vienna 3-5 May 2024
Glasgow Artists’ Moving Image Studios, Glasgow, May 17, 2024
Alchemy Film and Moving Image Festival, Hawick, Scotland, May 2-5 2024
Iranian Documentary Film Festival, Munich, May-June 2024
Allegra Laboratory, (online) screening and conversation with Alia Mossallam organized by Çiçek İlengiz, April 25, 2024
Critical Media Lab, “The Fire and The Song” series, University of Basel, April 4, 2024
Critical Media Lab, McGill University, Montreal, April 2, 2024
Official Selection: Scenes of Extraction, Glasgow Film Festival: Gestures of Memory, Glasgow, March 1st 2024
“The Times, The Chronicle, The Witness, and The Observer” screening series, Gene Siskel Film Center, Chicago, Dec 12, 2023
“Visualizing Extraction,” Film screening and conversation with Philip Scheffner, Filmhaus, Cologne, Dec 12, 2023
Film screening at “Entangled Archives of Wars: Experiences, Images, and Politics of Representation Symposium,” Historical Museum of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Sarajevo, Dec 1st, 2023
35th Ljubljana Biennale: From the void came gifts of cosmos, Artistic director and curator Ibrahim Mahama, Slovenia, September 2023- January 2024
“Petromelancholia,” Curator Alexander Klose, Brutus, Rotterdam, Netherlands, Sep-Nov 2023
Art and science exhibition, Cultural Center of Belgrade, Serbia, Oct-Nov 2023
Official Selection: Scenes of Extraction, Middle East Studies Association Film Festival, Nov 2-5 2023
Official Selection (Main Competition): Scenes of Extraction, The Archivio Aperto Film Festival: The Future is Memory, Bologna, Italy, Oct 2023
Official Selection: Scenes of Extraction, Open City Documentary Film Festival, London, Sep 10, 2023
Official Selection: Scenes of Extraction, FRONTEIRA Documentary Film Festival, Brasilia, August 2023
Official Selection and nominated for Best Experimental Film: Scenes of Extraction, BlackStar Film Festival, Philadelphia, August 2023
Blacklight Photo Festival Special Screening Program, Tampere, Finland, June 2023
Official Selection: Scenes of Extraction, 20th Millennium Docs Against Gravity Film Festival, Poland, May 12- May 21 2023
“Crude Aesthetics,” Block Museum Cinema, Northwestern University, March 3rd, 2023
Official Selection: Scenes of Extraction, Berlinale Forum Expanded: World Premiere of Scenes of Extraction, Feb 16-26 2023
Screening program, Curated by Azin Feizabadi and Asrin Haidari, Moderna Museet, Stockholm, Sweden, Jan 2023
Screening program, Moussem Nomadisch Kunstencentrum, Brussels, Feb 2023
Screening program, “Hijra with Shasha,” Curated Róisín Tapponi and commissioned by Sumayya Vally and Shumi Bose, Royal Academy of Art, London, Jan 10, 2023
Institute Francais Cinema, Screening program “Image Movement,” programmed by Sam I-shan, Photo Phnom Penh Festival, Cambodia, October 2022
Video installation at the Dream City Festival, Tunis, Tunisia, September-October 2022
Carpintarias de São Lázaro, “Back of my hand,” Curated by Sara Castelo Branco, Lisbon, Portugal, May-June 2022
Gabès Cinéma Fen Festival, Video program curated by Rabih Mroué, Gabès, Tunisia, May 2022
Museo de Arte de Zapopan (MAZ), Sala Abierta 15: Desmontajes Audiovisuales, a collaboration with AYER (online video program), México, Feb-March 2022
Université du Québec en Outaouais Galleries, “Chercher l’ouverture – Franchissements,” Curated by Véronique Leblanc, Quebec, Nov 2021, Jan 2022
AYERAYER Gallery, “Desmontajes Audiovisuales,” Curated by Esteban King, Guadalajara, México, Oct 2021- Jan 2022
Montreal Arts Intercultural (MAI), Making Revolution: Collective Histories, New Imaginaries, Curated by Viviane Saglier and Farah Atoui, Nov 11-Dec 11 2021
Official Selection: One Image, Two Acts, International Documentary Film Festival of Buenos Aires (FIDBA), Argentina, December 2021
Official Selection: One Image, Two Acts, 10th Cinecipó - Insurgent Film Festival, Belo Horizonte, Brazil, December 2021
Official Selection: One Image, Two Acts, Iran International Documentary Film Festival Cinema Vérité, Tehran, December 2021
Official Selection: One Image, Two Acts, Cámara Lúcida - VI International Contemporary Film Festival, Ecuador, November 2021
Official Selection: One Image, Two Acts, Middle East Studies Association Film Festival, December 2021
Official Selection: One Image, Two Acts, 30__70 International Documentary Film Festival, Italy, November 2021
Sandberg Institute, Decolonial Futures Workshop Film Club, Amsterdam, Nov 9 2021
SAVVY Contemporary, How to find meaning in dead time, Curated by Ala Younis & Maha Mamoun, Berlin, August-September 2021
Official Selection: One Image, Two Acts, International Competition: Valdivia International Film Festival, Chile, October 2021
Official Selection: One Image, Two Acts, 17th Festival Internacional de Cine Independiente de La Plata Festi-Freak, Argentina, October 2021
Official Selection: One Image, Two Acts, International Competition 03: VIDEOEX International Experimental Film and Video Festival, Zurich, Switzerland, October 2021
Official Selection: One Image, Two Acts, Silvestre Section: IndieLisboa International Film Festival, Lisbon Portugal, August 2021
Official Selection: Mimesis Documentary Festival, Mimesis Center for Ethnographic and Documentary Art, University of Colorado at Boulder, August 9th, 2021
Charlotte Street Foundation, Aftermaths: Rethinking Social Crises, Curated by Jameson Paige, Kansas City, July 30th- August 28th 2021
Aaran Projects in collaboration with New Media Society + Parking Gallery, Arbitrary Lines I, Curated by Amirali Ghasemi, Tehran, July-August 2021
Official Selection: One Image, Two Acts, Short and Mid-length: 50th International Film Festival Rotterdam, June 2021
Official Selection: One Image, Two Acts, Sheffield Documentary Film Festival, Ghosts and Apparitions Section, UK, June 2021
Deluge Contemporary Art, “Right of Return,” Online video program, Curated by Deborah de Boer and Todd Eacrett, British Columbia, April- May, 2021
Official Selection: One Image, Two Acts, Ann Arbor Film Festival Competition 3 Program, March 23- 28 2021
Official Selection and nominated for Golden Key Award: One Image, Two Acts, Kassel Documentary Film and Video Festival, Germany, November 2020
Official Selection and nominated for National Competition for Short and Mid-length: One Image, Two Acts, Montreal International Documentary Festival (RIDM), November 2020
Hinterland Gallery, Arbitrary Lines I, Curated by Amirali Ghasemi, Austria, Oct-Nov 2020
MacKenzie Art Gallery, Speculating Art History, Curated by Tak Pham, Regina, Canada, Sep-Dec 2020
Weinberg/Newton Gallery, Anthem, Curated by Kasia Houlihan, Chicago, Sep-Dec 2020
Arprim, Show of Hands: Manipulation, Appropriation and Mobility of the Printed Image, Curated by Emmanuelle Choquette & Marie-Pier Bocquet, Montréal, Jan-Feb 2020
Michigan State University, Not Far From Here: Recent Iranian Video Art, Michigan, United States, 2020
La Bande Vidéo, Residency presentation and screening of “What Remains From War Making and Image Making,” Québec City, Dec 6, 2019
Complex Images (Komplexe Bilder), Curated by Maia Gusberti, Cinema Rex, Bern, Switzerland, 2019
Atlanta Contemporary, COCO HUNDAY, Curated by Jason Lazarus, Atlanta, 2019
Official Selection: Notes on Seeing Double, 22nd Antimatter (Media Arts) Festival, Victoria, British Columbia, Canada, 2019
Official Selection: Notes on Seeing Double, 9th Cairo Film and Video Festival, Cimateque, Cairo, 2019
Ignition 15, Curated by Nicole Burisch and Michèle Thériault, Leonard and Bina Ellen Gallery, Montréal, 2019
Official Selection: Notes on Seeing Double, 32nd European Media Arts Festival Media Campuse, Program: Flickering Cosmos, Germany, 2019
Official Selection: Notes on Seeing Double, 46th Athens International Film and Video Festival, Program: Under the Boot, Ohio, United States, 2019
Official Selection: Notes on Seeing Double, 16th Iowa City International Documentary Film Festival, Iowa City, United States, 2019
Cultural Centre of Belgrade, Iranian Artists’ Films Program, Curated by Zohreh Deldadeh, Serbia, 2019
Official Selection: Notes on Seeing Double, 2nd Cosmic Rays Experimental Film Festival, Programmed by Sabine Gruffat & Bill Brown, Screening Program: Behind the Glass, Varsity Theatre, North Carolina, 2019
Stray Cat Film Center, Screening, Program: Not Found, Kansas City, 2019
3rd Festival of Cinematic & Audio Visual Experimentation (CAVE 3), Program: Not Found, Curated by Molly Garrett, Cellular Cinema, Minneapolis, 2019
“STORY TELLING- Video works from Romania and Videonale,” Rezidenta BRD Scena9, Organized by the Goethe Institute Bucharest and the National University of Arts, Bucharest, 2018
“Monument in Flux,” Iran-Argentina Program, Espacio Belgrado, Buenos Aires, 2018
"Immaterial Collection II, forum3: evolving icons," Curated by Joy Stacey, Beirut Art Center, Lebanon, 2018
“Fingers Pointing Outside The Frame” (Monitor 12 Tour), Khoj International Artist Association, New Delhi, India, 2018
“Fingers Pointing Outside The Frame” (Monitor 12 Tour), Theertha Red Dot Gallery, Colombo, Sri Lanka, 2017
“Fingers Pointing Outside The Frame” (Monitor 12 Tour), Experimenta; The International Festival of Moving Image Art, India, 2017
“Fingers Pointing Outside The Frame” (Monitor 12 Tour), Articule, Montreal, 2017
“Monument in flux,” Curated by Amir Ali Ghasemi, W139 Gallery, Amsterdam, 2017
“Documents Infield,” Site-specific installation, Coco Hunday artist-run space, Tampa, FL, 2017
States of Prose (two-person show with Marina Miliou-Theocharaki), Roman Susan Gallery, Chicago, IL, 2017
“Inside Out,” Curated by Katharina Jesberger, Centrum Ciachovna Arzenal, Zilina, Slovakia, 2017
“Invisible Present Tense 2.0,” (screening) Kunstraum Potsdam in Germany in collaboration with Parking Gallery in Tehran, July, 2017
"Thinging Bodies" curated by Danny Giles, organized in conjunction with "Let me Be an Object that Screams" curated by Matt Morris, Gallery 400, Chicago, 2017
“Reproducibles,” Museo de Arte Pereira, Risaralda, Colombia, 2017
Museo de Arte Moderno y Contemporáneo de Palma de Mallorca (FIVA tour), España, 2017
Centro Cultural España Córdoba (FIVA tour), España, 2017
“Cineclub16,” (Experimental Sound Work and Film Screening), Espectro Electromagnético, México, DF, 2017
Museo Histórico Cabildo (FIVA tour), Uruguay, 2017
"Fingers Pointing Outside The Frame” (Monitor 12 Tour), Hamilton Arts Inc, Ontario, Canada, 2017
"Fingers Pointing Outside The Frame” (Monitor 12 Tour), The Halifax Independent Filmmakers Festival, Halifax, Canada, 2017
Official Selection: Auxiliary Mirrors, Images Festival, Monitor 12: "Fingers Pointing Outside of the Frame,” South Asian Visual Arts Centre, Toronto, 2017
Official Selection: Disposables, VIDEONALE.16, Festival For Video and Time-Based Arts, Kunstmuseum Bonn, Germany, 2017
Limited Access Festival 07, "Remote Homecoming,” New Media Projects, Tehran, Iran, 2017
“Reproducibles,” Quintal Cultural, Bogotá, Colombia, 2017
Official Selection: Auxiliary Mirrors, FIVA 06: Festival Internacional de Video Arte, (Winner of Best Short Film), National Library of Buenos Aires, Argentina, 2016
“Street Lights,” (Screening), Roman Susan Gallery, Chicago, 2016
VAFA International Video Festival, Orient Foundation, Macau, 2016
“SPACEBODIES II,” Curated by Andrea Spaziani, Transart Triennial, Berlin, 2016
Experimental Film and Video Exhibition 2016, Czong Institute of Contemporary Art, South Korea, 2016
“Pdf-Objects,” Curated by Jason Lazarus, Mana Contemporary, Chicago, 2016
“Displacement,” Curated by Scott Hunter, South of the Tracks Gallery, Chicago, 2016
“A wavelike motion,” Nightingale Micro Cinema, Chicago, 2016
“Pro Bias,” Group Exhibition of ACRE Residency, Bike Room Gallery, Chicago, 2015
“Dark Fiber,” (Group Film and Video Screening), Curated and organized by Marissa Lee Benedict & David Rueter, Art EXPO Chicago, Illinois, 2015
A Survey of Recent Contemporary Moving Images; Part One, Comfort Station, Chicago, 2015
“Preview VI,” Chicago Artist Coalition, Chicago, 2014
“Crisis of Conformity: Relocating The Subject,” Chicago Urban Art Society, Chicago, IL, 2014
“Evanston Art Center's 2014 Biennial,” Curated by Allison Peters Quinn and Sergio Gomez, Evanston, 2014
MFA Thesis Show, Sullivan Galleries, Chicago, 2014
“Risky Encounters,” 6018 North Gallery, Chicago, 2014
“Real Estate,” 6018 North Gallery, Chicago, 2013
“(UN)(DIS)COVERED,” SUG Galleries, Chicago, 2013
“Boundaries,” Eisentrager-Howard Gallery, Lincoln, NE, 2013
“Global Positioning Systems,” Curated by Amanda Ross-Ho, Art EXPO Chicago, 2013
(select) Artist Talks | Lectures | Conference Presentations
(upcoming) UnionDocs, Essay film workshop with Dónal Foreman, December 14, 2024
Material and Visual Worlds of Oil Infrastructure in Histories of the Global South, Panel discussant, NYU Abu Dhabi, Oct 23, 2024
Open City Documentary Film Festival, “The Essay Film as Critical Thought,” Panel discussion, Sep 10th, 2023
NYU Abu Dhabi, (online) Presentation: “Visual Worlds of Oil Infrastructure in the Global South Workshop,” March 27th, 2023
Block Museum, “Crude Aesthetics: Oil on Film,” Roundtable discussion with Mona Damluji and Brian R Jacobson, Northwestern University, March 2-3, 2023
Goethe Institute in Exile and ACUD Galerie, “Archives and Counter-archives,” Artist talk, Berlin, Feb 22nd, 2023
VOX Centre de l'image contemporaine, "Visualizing Extraction: A Roundtable with Siobhan Angus and Ishita Tiwary, Feb 9th, 2023
Conference Presentation, Middle East Studies Association Conference, Denver, December 1-4 2022
Petrocultures Conference, Panel participant: “New Petroleum Perspectives from the Global South: Visualizing and Connecting Oil Cultures of the Middle East and Latin America,” Stavanger, Norway, 24– 27 August 2022
McGill University, Panel Discussant, “Media Rurality” Conference, Montréal, June 2022
Cell Projects, PENG Zuqiang’s book publication launch with Alvin Li, June 19th, 2022
New York University’s Iranian Studies Initiative, Screening and discussion, Feb 24th, 2022
Visible Evidence Conference: Documentary and Democracy in Crisis, (online) Presentation: “Sites and Sights of oil: Visual Regimes of Extraction in Iran,” Frankfurt, Germany, December 18th, 2021
A.M. Qattan Foundation, (online) Artistic workshop as part of “Unprepared” series, Ramallah, Palestine, Dec 6th, 2021
L'Observatoire des Mondes Arabes et Musulmans and Université libre de Bruxelles, (online) Artist lecture as part of the program “The stories we tell: Engaging archives otherwise,” Convened by Omar Jabary Salamanca and Sahar Aurore Saeidnia, Brussels, November 3rd, 2021
Free City Radio, Interview with Stefan Christoff, link here, October 2022
Multiple Ecologies, Diverse Ontologies Artistic Research Symposium, (online) Presentation: “Archives of Extraction/Subterranean Struggles,” University of Plymouth, UK, September 2021
University of Colorado Center for Ethnographic and Documentary Art, (online) Roundtable discussion: “Extraction and Erasure,” moderated by Erin Espelie, August 9th, 2021
European Network of Cinema and Media Studies, Transitions: Moving Images and Bodies Conference, (online) Presentation title: “Documenting the Sites and Sights of oil: Colonial Petromodernity and Visual Regimes of Extraction in Iran." University of Palermo, June 13th, 2021
Sheffield Documentary Film Festival, Stories Of Struggle, Stories Of Diaspora, Q&A Discussion Moderated by Jonathan Ali, June 5th, 2021
International Film Festival Rotterdam, Afterthoughts: Conversation with Maaike Gouwenberg, June 2nd, 2021
University of California Santa Barbara, Guest speaker at “Oil and modernity” graduate seminar, May 10th, 2021
Ann Arbor Film Festival, Roundtable Q&A moderated by Bryan Konefsky, March 24th, 2021
McGill University, “Imaging and Imagining Intimacy” Conference, Panel discussant, Feb 11th, 2021
DePaul University, Public lecture: “Documenting oil: Extractable Matter and Film,” Feb 9th, 2021
Chicago Arts Partnership in Education Dialogue: “What is Publicness,” Artist talk: “Documents and Monuments,” Feb 4th, 2021
Stavanger Museum, Experiences of Oil Conference and Exhibition, Curated and programmed by Anne Szefer Karlsen and Helga Nyman, Video-Lecture: “Infrastructures of Time and Archives of the Future: Visual Regimes of oil and Colonial Modernity in Iran,” Stavanger, Norway, November 2020
Hinterland Gallery, Artist talk (online), Austria, Oct 2020
Artist talk for the screening program “Speculating Art History”, MacKenzie Art Gallery, Moderated by Tak Pham, Sep 2020
Montez Press Radio, “Big oil archive,” Radio interview with Colleen Tuite, September 2020
Feminist Media Studio, Presentation: “Image as Method: Citing, Siting, and Sighting in Photographic Media,” Montréal, Feb 2020
Global Emergent Media Lab, Presentation: “Labour of oil, Petrocultural Imaginaries, and Colonial Modernity in Iran: An Experimental Film and Multimedia Project,” November 2019, Montréal
American University of Beirut, Presentation: “Spectral Images: Colonial Archives of Oil Production and Passageways to Collective Memory in Contemporary Iran,” Transregional Academy, August, 2019
Illinois State University, Public lecture: “Thinking out Loud: Return to the Margins of Making,” March, 2019
Faculty of Fine Arts Wild Talks Podcast, “Leonard Cohen, Darth Vader & Food Trucks:” a roundtable discussion with Michael Rakowitz, Tammer El-Sheikh and David Howes, Nov 2017
ZK/U Center for Arts and Urbanistics, Artist Presentation, Berlin, July 2018
ZK/U Center for Arts and Urbanistics, OpenHaus, Berlin, July 2018
Institute for Cultural Inquiry, Presentation: “A Wavelike Motion: Postcoloniality and Testing the Limits of Representation,” Emerging Scholars Panel, NYU Global Asia/Pacific Art Exchange (GAX), Co-constituting The Global Symposium, Institute for Cultural Inquiry, Berlin, June 2018
University of South Florida, Visiting Artist Public lecture: “From the Point of Return,” Tampa, Florida, Oct 2017
SOMA Summer School, Artist Presentation, México, DF, July 2017
Halifax Independent Filmmakers Festival, Artist Presentation, 2017
College Arts Association Conference, "Extensions of Bodies: On Images, Archival Testimonies and Re-enactment,” presented at the New Media Caucus panel “Intersections: Cinema, Performance, Networked Media and Politics,” Washington, 2016
Pasfrada Cultural Organization and Out of Site Performance Festival, Artist Presentation: "Place, Space and Fictive Attempts,” Chicago, Illinois, 2015
Chicago Artist Coalition, “Babylon Lottery,” Poetry reading with Marina Miliou Theocharaky, 2015
School of the Art Institute of Chicago, “Inside Creative Minds,” Collaborative studio lecture with Dan Paz ,2015
LATITUDE Gallery, Roundtable discussion for the exhibition “Pro Bias,” Chicago, IL, 2015
University of Chicago, Center for Middle Eastern Studies, Artist Talk, “Change of Rhetoric,” 2014
School of the Art Institute of Chicago, James Weinstein Memorial Fellowship Thesis Presentation, 2013
School of the Art Institute of Chicago, MFA Graduate Lecture Series, 2012
Reviews | Bibliographies
“Seeing the archive as a form of visual optic and conceptual prism,” Interview with Kaput Magazine, 2023
Stéphanie Hornstein reviews Scenes of Extraction in Ciel Variable Magazine, Fall 2023, purchase the issue here.
Siobhan Angus reviews Scenes of Extraction in ESPACE Magazine, Issue 135, purchase the issue here.
“Disrupting the archive: Miranda Pennell’s Trouble and Sanaz Sohrabi’s Scenes of Extraction,” Written by Henrietta Williams for Open City, Sep 2023
“Open City Documentary Festival 2023: The Art of Non-Fiction,” Review of Open City by Alex Fletcher in Art Monthly, October 2023
“Unearthing the Substrata of Images: Interview with Sanaz Sohrabi,” EUME - Trafo – Blog for Transregional Research, 2023
“Film Show 024: Berlinale 2023, Part 1,” Review of Scenes of Extraction’s World Premiere by Michael Metzger, Tone Glow, 2023
“BERLINALE + WDK 2023 : PARTIE 6", Review of Scenes of Extraction’s World Premiere by Olivier Thibodeau, Panorama-cinema, 2023
“Sanaz Sohrabi on Scenes of Extraction,” Interview with Sonia Shechet Epstein, Museum of Moving Image, 2023
“Forum Expanded: An Atypical Orbit,” Interview with Ala Younis and Ulrich Ziemons, Arsenal – Institut für Film und Videokunst, Feb 2023
Artist profile, Le Sabord Magazine, Rhizomes Issue, Winter 2023
“Imag(in)ing oil” text by Sarah Nesbit, Vie des arts magazine, Issue 268, 2022
“Testimony-Images and Speculations in the works of Sanaz Sohrabi, Fanny Latreille et Simon Belleau,” text by Emmanuelle Choquette, Espace magazine, Spring-Summer 2022
"Sanaz Sohrabi, Hiding in Plain Sight: Archives of Oil," Review by Emmanuelle Choquette, Ciel variable 120 - FIGURES OF AFFIRMATION, Summer 2022
“The Tenant' — Joshua Schwebel and 'Hiding in Plain Sight: Archives of Oil' — Sanaz Sohrabi," Review by Saelan Twardy, C magazine 151, Spring 2022
“Are Images Ever Innocent?” Artist profile written by Tereza Rudolf, Fotograf Magazine- issue #41 Postdigital Photography, Czech, Winter 2022
“Best Artist Films of 2021,” Senses of Cinema, 2021
“Confronter l’Histoire,” Horschamp, Review of RIDM by Rémy Besson, 2021
Review of Sheffield Documentary Film Festival (in French) by Occitane Lacurie and Barnabé Sauvage
“Esto también pasará,” Review (in Spanish) of “One Image, Two Acts” at 17th Festival Internacional de Cine Independiente de La Plata by Blas Martín
»در دالانهای حقیقت/ نگاهی به مستندهای «بچههای اعجوبه»، «احتضار»، «آن شب» و «یک تصویر، دو برداشت, Review (in Farsi) of “One Image, Two Acts” at Iran Cinema Verite Film Festival by Shahram Ashraf Abyaneh
یک تصویر و دو برداشت، جستجوی تاریخ نفت ایران در آرشیو بی پی، Review (in Farsi) of “One Image, Two Acts” at Sheffield Doc/Fest, by bbcpersian.com
F News Magazine, "The Austere Poeticism of Disruption," Review of solo exhibition “Spatial Agreements,” Written by Veronica Sines, 2015, print
Select Writings
“Petropublics Across Borders: Mapping OPEC’s Visual Cultures of Decolonization,” In 35th Ljubljana Biennale Reader, edited by Exit Frame Collective, November 2023
“Unmasking Petro-Utopias in Iran: Searching for Acts of Refusal and Solidarity in the British Petroleum Archives", Ajam Media Collective, August 2023, Online
Museumsforlaget, Oil Cultures from the Middle East and Latin America (OCMELA) in Conversation with Murtaza Vali, titled “Petromobilities in the Global South,” In “Experiences of Oil,” Anthology edited by Anne Szefer Karlsen and Helga Nyman, Norway, March 2022
Kunstlicht Journal, Visual essay titled “Ruminations on Petropublics Across Borders.” In The Worldliness Of Oil: Recognition And Relations, Vol. 42 No. 3-4. Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Fall 2021
Weinberg/Newton Gallery, “Essay as Form, Image as Method,” Exhibition catalog text, Sep 2020, online
Art Newcity, “And the Archive Gazes Back: Naeem Mohaiemen at the Art Institute of Chicago,” March 2019, online
Art Newcity, "The All-Too-Long History of Contemporary Art from Middle-East," May 2016, print and online
Contango Journal, AUCTORITAS, 2017, Issue 1 2017, print
Graduate and Undergraduate Level Teaching Experience
Concordia University, Assistant Professor, Department of Communication and Media Studies, 2024- present
Concordia University, Lecturer, Department of Art History, Fall 2023
University of Illinois at Chicago, Adjunct Assistant Professor, 2021-2023
Maryland Institute College of Arts, Visiting Artist, Experimental Documentary class, April 2023
Concordia University, Guest Critic, Photography 400, April 2023
School of the Art Institute of Chicago, MFA Graduate Coordinator, Summer 2021
Concordia University, Guest Critic, Photography 300, April, 2021
Concordia University, Guest Critic, Large Format Photography, November 2019
University of Illinois at Chicago, Guest critic, MFA final critique, Chicago, May 2019
Illinois State University, Visiting Artist (Undergraduate Level), Spring 2019
Concordia University, Guest Critic, Photographic Vision: Theory & Practice Undergraduate Seminar, Dec 2018
Concordia University, Teaching Assistant-Film Aesthetics, Fall 2018
Concordia University, Teaching Assistant-Advance Video, Fall 2017
University of South Florida, School of Art and Art History, Visiting Artist (Graduate Level),October 2017
School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Lecturer, (Advance undergraduate Level), Jan-May 2015
School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Teaching Assistant, 2012-2014
(Assisted seven different undergraduate courses on introduction to lens-based media practices, both theory and practice)
Research Affiliations
Institute for Environment, Conservation and Sustainability, University of Toronto Scarborough, External member (2023- Present)
Oil and Culture from Middle East and Latin America Group (OCMELA), Member (2021-ongoing)
Ethnocultural Art Histories Research (EAHR) Group, Faculty of Fine Arts, Concordia University, Member (2018- Present)
Feminist Media Studio, Faculty of Arts and Science, Concordia University, Research Assistant (2018-2019, 2023); Member (2017- Present)
Global Emergent Media Lab, Faculty of Fine Arts, Concordia University, Programmer (2018-2019); Member (2018- Present)
Milieux Institute and Post Image Lab, Concordia University, Member (2017- Present)
Curatorial and Research Experience
Jury member, SBC galerie d'art contemporain Residency Selection Committee, Montréal 2024
Programmer, Political Aesthetics: Resisting Displacement, Displacing Resistance, la lumiere collective x Feminist Media Studio, Montréal, 2023-2024
Jury member, Mimesis Documentary Film Festival, Mimesis Center for Ethnographic and Documentary Art, Colorado, August 2022
Research Assistant, Prof. Krista Lynes, Archival research at KEW Archives, London, August 2022
Research Assistant, Prof. Masha Salazkina, Archival research, Sep-Dec 2021
Research Assistant and co-curator, Curatorial project, “Politics of Alternative Media,” (with Sima Kokotovic and Giuseppe Fidotta), Concordia University, 2018-2019
Curator of video program, “Long Exposure: On Performing the Multiples,” Feminist Media Studio, Concordia University, Feb 2019
Research Assistant, Feminist Media Studio, Concordia University, 2018-2019
Co-curator, Group exhibition: “Dissident Vectors,” Hexagram, Concordia University, Montréal, 2018
Co-founder and co-editor, Tamaas Quarterly Journal, 2016- Present
Co-organizer, Curatorial project, “Parlor Room Visiting Artist Program,” School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Department of Photography, 2013- 2014
Curator, Group exhibition: “(UN)(DIS)COVERED,” SUG Galleries, Chicago, 2013
(Select) General Press
ledevoir.com, Dix expos d'arts visuels à surveiller, 2023, online and print
Vie des arts Magazine, Partager des blessures communes, Review of Franchissements, 2022, online and print
McGill Tribune, MAI’s new exhibit ‘Making Revolution’ dissects the anatomy of revolutions, 2021, online
ledevoir.com, Galeries et centres d’artistes au diapason de la diversité, 2021, online
thecanadian.news, Galleries and artist-run centers in tune with diversity, 2021, online
Elliotjreichert.net, Interview with Elliot Reichert about the exhibition "Documents In Field," 2017, online
Inside/Within Magazine, "Map-making in action,” Interview with Kate Sierzputowski , 2017, online