Thank you to a meeting with Professor Lisa Stansbie at De Montfort University in Leicester this week, I am exploring the work of Shirin Neshat. In particular, the artist’s trilogy of films, Turbulent, Rapture, Fervor.
Turbulent (1998) was the first of the series, exploring “the male-female dynamic in relation to social structures in Islam, specifically in Iran” (Neshat, 2000, p. 20). Rapture (1999) continues the focus, both use the idea of “opposites”, in the artist’s works: “I presented the idea of “opposites” visually, spatially, and sonically” (p. 21). The ideas appear as contrasts on two screens. Fervor (2000) instead focuses on “commonalities”. In the final work, instead of the screens appearing in the gallery opposite each other, the work is on adjoining screens. All three use a common audio track, inviting the viewer to ‘edit’ the work by shifting their attention from one screen to another (p. 21). The idea of dialogue, films talking to each other is relevant to the films I am making on the Berman collection. Lisa described the films in Neshat’s trilogy as films that ‘wait for each other’. Using a shared, common audio track, and visuals in dialogue with each other will be a way for me to represent the ‘characters’ in the Berman story. I am focusing on Jerry Berman, his brother Israel, and Jerry’s friends, Meyer and Sonia Fortes. I presented my work in progress at BASEES Annual Conference on Friday at the University of Birmingham.
Jerry Berman Digital Letters from Ukraine in the Holodomor: Network Diagram. Source: Author, 2026.