performances
Überleben im 21. Jahrhundert
The Deichtorhallen missed the opportunity to showcase the (surviving) lives of Afghan women in the exhibition “Survival in the 21st Century.”
One Sunday, she enters the Deichtorhallen, wrapped in a burka. Her silent and solitary protest is directed against the forgetting of these women.
She moves deliberately and defiantly through the exhibition, positioning herself directly in front of the artworks, forcing visitors to perceive her. Yet many look away; others glance at her with hostility. Doesn’t this act of looking away make these women even more invisible?
An attempt by the artist to break through this: she reminds us that these women still exist – even if, in the world of public attention, they seem long forgotten.
Das vergangene Wort
In this performance installation, sounds are produced in unusual ways – for example, using devices like a sewing machine – while two performers sing in German and Persian. At the same time, an object moves through the space, from which a person eventually emerges. The walls of the installation are made from the pages of several German-Persian dictionaries, whose words resonate throughout the space, forming a physical echo of the sung languages.
Vocal: Tinoosh Kiany and Rahel Schaad
Verschleierte Entschleierung
Atelierhaus im Anscharpark, Kiel | 2018
Standing on a single high-heeled shoe, she is dressed in a full-body sequin suit, her face partially veiled by her hair. In the genital area, the skull of a dead animal is visible. About every minute, she changes her position, struggling to maintain balance on the single heel. Her movements and poses reproduce familiar female postures and representations from contemporary media.
After a while, an opera singer begins to set the poem “Do Not Let Your Hair Be Carried by the Wind” by the Persian poet Hafez for mezzo-soprano. Accompanied by a violinist, an expressive dance follows, portraying a transformation shaped by struggle.
Vocal: Merlind Pohl
Violin: Mara Scholz
Wo sind meine Schuhe
Kunstverein, Marburg | 2017
Leaning against a rolled-up red carpet, the masked figure stands in the center of the room. Her black hair is styled into two long braids that transition into fabric and eventually end as strands of cables. The bare upper body is covered with a chain-like weave of safety pins, which is mirrored in the hem of her ankle-length skirt. The skirt is made from the same white curtain fabric as the mask.
Like a statue, she remains motionless for about an hour, until a singing voice emerges from the background and movement slowly begins. A poem by the Persian poet Rumi is recited in Persian, followed by an expressive dance accompanied by mezzo-soprano, double bass, and frame drum.
The increasing speed of the music, combined with the body’s movements in an interplay of motion and stillness, intensifies the performance, exploring the boundaries between violence and feminine beauty.
Vocal: Merlind Pohl
Fram drum: Babak Masali
Double bass: Heiko Maschmann
Schatrantsch II (das Schachspiel)
شطرنج II
The performance begins with a washing ritual that combines symbols and gestures from different cultures. Themes of guilt and innocence, freedom and constraint, black and white are explored and intertwined. A mezzo-soprano gradually mirrors the movements until the performer exits the space. What remains are black footprints, tracing each step across the white paper.
Vocal : Merlind Pohl
Die Erinnerung
Anscharpark, Kiel | 2016
The site-specific performance unfolds across two consecutive rooms, exploring the interplay between repetition, materiality, and memory. It refers to the work “Aufgestrichen.”
In the first room, the artist, elegantly dressed, stands facing a sculpture. In a recurring gesture, she repeatedly draws the same object, discards the sheet, and begins again. Through constant repetition, the form gradually loses its contours and condenses into a circle – a movement between control and dissolution.
In the second room, she encounters the same sculpture, this time made of a different material. As she recounts a childhood memory, repeating it with subtle variations, she begins to open the seams of her elegant dress and removes her shoes. The dress slowly transforms into an oversized shirt – a quiet metamorphosis of form and identity.
Drawing by: Jisu Jeong
Schatrantsch I (das Schachspiel)
شطرنج I
ehemalige Schlachterei, Kiel | 2016
The performance begins with a spin. The body is partially exposed, and the surroundings feel like a circle with no escape. The spinning continues until balance is lost – the body falls, the hair – artificial and smooth – remains suspended. The head is bare, visible. The performer wears a long white skirt, from which her body slowly emerges.
Wohllust
Dressed in blue fishnet tights and a revealing top made of wrapping paper, with a rose-colored cloth wrapped around her head, she wears a black high-heeled shoe on one foot and a beige papier-mâché high-heeled shoe on the other, which gradually falls off throughout the performance. Wooden hoops adorn her arms.
Throughout the performance, she engages with the existing artworks in the exhibition. She generates sounds through a microphone and amplifier she carries, using her own body and clothing as well as those of the audience. This produces a wide range of loud, unexpected sounds.
Oase des Moments
„Should you call on me
I am beyond the Nil-land
Beyond the Nil-land is a place“
Sohrab Sepehri
ع (eyn)
This performance was created in remembrance of the victims of the Islamic Republic of Iran, particularly the women who were raped in prison during the mass executions of the 1980s, due to a religious interpretation held by the regime that prohibits the execution of virgins. The performance is an act of remembrance and condemnation – a silent protest against patriarchal violence, religious abuse of power, and the systematic injustice inflicted upon women’s bodies.