Taravat Talepasand Art
Art Review and Gallery
Art Review: Ahreeman X
Art: Taravat Talepasand
taravatt@gmail.com
May 14, 2011
Taravat Talepasand the Iranian Artist
Taravat’s Art is a Neo Traditional Artistic Social Statement
Spotlight of the Season
We have a brand new hot out of the oven star securing her place in the IPC Spotlight of the Season. She is the one and only rising star in the Iranian art arena, please welcome Ms. Taravat Talepasand. This woman fits right in IPC and you may ask why? The answer is very simple. We are all about breaking all taboos. We have been breaking religious, philosophical, political, historical, social, fashion, sexual and every other taboo in the Iranian community for over a decade. Taravat in her own special way is also a Mistress of breaking taboos!
Order of Lion and Sun (2007)
Welcome to the Neo Persian Emblem of Lion and Sun (Taravat Style)!
This piece is most likely the most feminist version of the emblem of Lion and Sun which has ever created! A woman as the lion and a woman as the sun are representing the traditional Persian Emblem of the Lion and Sun. Both of these women are artistically inspired by the self portray of Taravat. This piece is a clear scream for the women’s rights in Iran and a bold social statement.
Taravat’s work is a right in your face type of art! She is always challenging herself, challenging the traditional dogmatic society and challenging the viewers to think and to explore another perspective.
 
Taravat’s Name
Every time I hear this name, I feel fresh and refreshed! It reminds me of the freshness of the spring flowers (Taravat-e Golha-ye Bahar-e). It reminds me of the spring wind spreading the smelling joy and the fragrance of the Hyacinth, Jasmine, Honeysuckle, Rose and Magnolia. Taravat reminds me of Nowruz Persian New Year on the first day of spring.
Islamic Youth (2009)
This piece has the potential of becoming a cult classic! This is so deep, fashionable and socially questionable that I should not even try to define it! I leave it all up to you.
Taravat means “Freshness” and Talepasand means “Fortune Liker” (Tale’ = Fortune + Pasand = Like => Liker of Fortune or Fortune Liker). Now I don’t know how much of a horoscope lover she is or how much she believes in destiny, yet her name means a “Freshness Fortune Liker”! For some bizarre reason, every time I hear her name or talk to her, I smell a delighting fragrance in the wind which is directing me towards my destined fortune! She makes me feel tingled all up and down!
Art Style
Her artistic work is a collage of the old traditional Persian Miniatures mixed with new modern Persian Surreal Abstract. She is a social challenging taboo breaker both in artistic and in social aspects. Some of her paintings are self portrays which within them she explores her duality. She explores her Iranian and her American duality and she also explores her Traditional and her Modern duality.
Malheur (2008)
Duality?!
Taravat admires traditional Qajar Dynasty paintings and art style. In fact you can view the Qajar effect in her paintings, yet mixed with the modern surreal spices. She is not afraid to mix and match, experiment and invent.
A good number of her paintings are self portrays which in them she portrays herself in a various odd yet realistic situations.
The Liberal Iranian (2007)
This is a classic! They should replace the Allah logo of IRI on the center flag with this painting as the centerpiece! That would surely put the shiver and shakes deep in to the Mullahs’ spines! For Allah’s sake, this piece is surely blasphemy and a sin! In this piece Taravat is letting it all hang out while strictly covering her hair with the Islamic hijab (scarf) and even that is red! This piece reminds me of a famous social critic poem by the Qajar Era poet “Iraj Mirza” from my dynasty:
To surat ra neku gir,
Ke man surat daham kar-e khod az zir!
(Cover thine face tight,
Thus I’ll do my deed from beneath!)
Some of her other paintings are all about women’s rights, women’s hopes, women’s dreams and women’s feature goals to achieve wither as Iranian women inside Iran, Iranian American women or the global femme population.
So some of her work is about duality and some of her work is about women’s expressions and rights, yet all of her work is radically progressive and ahead of her time. She is a visual and experimental artist ahead of her time. She is an advanced expressionist who is not afraid to express herself, breaks the traditional taboos, be controversial and to start a new. Now that sounds like “Avant-Garde” to me. Do you now understand why she fits right in IPC? Who knows, maybe she is my long lost cousin!
About Taravat
Born in Eugene and raised in Portland Oregon, you can sense the beauty and the unique Oregon effects in her paintings. She was born in 1979, yes, she is a child of revolution (Iranian Revolution). In fact the Iranian Revolution had eventually become a base for her material and future art.
Taravat is as traditional as eating Persian food on “Sofreh” (Persian traditional dining mat spread on the floor) and in fact she was eating on the Sofreh when she was a child (while the dining table remained untouched in the dining room); however, Taravat is also as progressive as her art is an out in open social statement in the face of the Shiite Muslim Chauvinism and Hierarchy of the Mosque! In fact her art is openly aggressive and offensive to the religious and the fundamentalist establishment. Let’s put it this way: the woman is simply shameless and her art is way too bold. Hell, this is the reason we love her and nominated her for Spotlight of the Season!
The Censored Garden (2008)
Taravat loves to play. She plays with traditional and superficial social values, religion, male chauvinism, dogma, fashion, sex and politics. Taravat is a sensual and sexual artist, an out in open feminist and an in your face, taboo breaking revolutionary expressionist. I believe she has something new to say and she is surely acting upon it and expressing herself in her paintings.
Even though a liberal, I would not hold that against her! I am sure if she hangs around with me for a while, she will grow out of it!
Hafez, September 9, 1978 (2009)
On this date, Taravat’s mother has left Iran to protect her unborn child (Taravat). It was right in the midst of the revolution and she had to make a choice. In a way, by her action, she has secured Taravat’s future. This is the reason that Taravat refers to her and this painting as “Hafez” (the protector). This is a very special piece for Taravat. The painting is very poetic. Khayyam’s tomb is well portrayed at the background.
We have dime a dozen Persian painters and artists in the Persian global community, but if you as a painter make it to the IPC Spotlight of the Season, then it could only mean that now you are established and now you are amongst the best of the best. Taravat surely deserves the recognition and she is surely securing her place amongst the best that Iranian Art Arena has to offer. Welcome to The Club!
To read more about Taravat and her Art, review:
Taravat Talepasand Index
Taravat Talepasand Website
Enjoy the gallery:
Ayatollah Land (2009)
Caviar Dreams (2009)
Danger (2009)
Beware the future rise of the Iranian Women!
Left to Right:
Dan (Iranian Women taking off the death masks) + Ger (Persian Femme Lions tearing off Mullah’s rectums) = Danger
Ger (Jer) = Tearing Off (in Persian)
Dan + Ger = Danger
Get it?!
Death to Bitches! (2008)
Discipline (2009)
Andarooni, Birooni, Lies and Man (Insider, Outsider, Lies and Man) (2011)
Information: Andarooni, Birooni was a structure type and an architectural style of building luxury homes during the Qajar Era. Old fashion houses always had an outhouse (Birooni) and then the main house inside (Andarooni). To walk in, one had to primarily get in to the outhouse, then garden and then the main house.
Remark: Also Andarooni, Birooni (Innie and Outie) does truly sound perverted to me!
I have made a remark to Taravat about this piece:
The title of this piece is surely perverted sounding. I believe disregarding the true nature of this piece; you have selected this double meaning title, simply because you are yet another perverted Persian girl! What a riot (I kill me)!
“Andarooni Biroonit Bedam” (damn that sounds perverted)!
Hey Haji (2010)
Taravat is getting Haji’s (pilgrim) attention!
Another self portrait based on a social critic of hijab and chador.
The face (with paint) and the hair (with towel) are covered (Islamically proper); however, her body is naked (under the fur coat)!
Self Portrait: Sanctioned (2011)
Physicality of Death (2010)
Skeletara (2008)
Suicide is Painless (2008)
Social Criticism of Femme Suicide Bombing?!
Suicide is Painless II (2008)
Suicide is Painless Dear (2008)
Duality?!
Traditions are as Followed (2008)
Why so worried king? (2009)
Aqa Mohammad Shah Qajar
Now Taravat, I know that you think you are being cute by painting This piece and I also am aware that many so-called Iranian In-tell-egg-chew-alls including some wanna be TV Hosts and Historians do talk a lot of Shiite about Aqa Mohammad Shah Qajar. They refer to him as a blood thirsty, cheap Turk. Of course these wanna be scholars are historically illiterate. The reality is that he was the last Emperor (Shahanshah) of Iran who protected the integrity of the Persian Empire with the skin of his teeth. He was a great emperor, a good patriot and a brave man. No one (including Russian, British and Ottoman Empires) dared to even think of crossing the Persian Empire’s boundaries during his era. As a Qajar, I am damn proud of my great ancestor Aqa Mohammad Shah. After him (due to unworthiness of his successors), Persian Empire had become Persian Kingdom and Iran was no more an empire.
Now I have no clue if you are mocking Aqa Khan because of his facial expression in his original portrait? Or you have alter motives to bring this great emperor down? Either way, shame on you Taravat! After reading this, put your head down and be ashamed of yourself. Don’t make me to come to that “Gay Liberal Sanctuary Town” (San Francisco) and personally spank you, but then again knowing you, tells me that you may truly enjoy that!
PS: To all historically illiterate critics of Aqa Mohammad Shah Qajar, go educate yourselves:
First and Last Persian Emperors
8000 Years of Iranian History (Part 3)
Still Life: Half Sin (2011)
Chloes: Nowruz (2008)
This is a fine spice to the Nowruz (Persian New Year).
For more information on Nowruz, read:
Iran Culture and Language Index
This would bring us to the end of our presentation; hope you enjoyed Taravat and her art as much as we did.
Dr. X
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