Rhonda Schaller Studio is pleased to present Super East-West Woman: Living on the Axis, Fighting Evil Everywhere, a solo exhibition of photographs by Aphrodite Desiree Navab. The show opens Saturday, October 20th, with an opening reception from 2:00 to 4:00, and runs through November 17th.

From the catalogue introduction:

The exhibit will feature color pigment prints which are solemn, funny, and contradictory - yet starkly luminous. The theme of coexistence and metamorphosis in her political and cultural critique deepens with each of the 14 pictures selected from the series. Navab tells us “The idea started to take shape in 2002 after President George W. Bush branded Iran as one of the three nations comprising an “axis of evil.” It re-minded me of when I was nine years old and escaped with my family during the Islamic revolution in 1978-79. Then, Iran’s new leaders labeled the United States as the country of the “Great Satan.”

The intermeshing of her cobalt blue chador (Farsi for Islamic covering) and the cadmium red of her Superman T-shirt, the unspoken issues of being a woman in fear and in power, dealing with war and peace, the always haunted sense of awareness deeply ingrained and compelling within us since 9/11 - is conjured and dealt with, with strong humor as Navab uses her own body and dual cultural identities as subject matter.

These works speak to Navab’s fascination with the multiple roles of the artist, as director, actor and image, as well as to the political activist looking to create an opening conversation and dialogue. Navab explains: “Armored with her Persian amulets and Greek anti-evil eye bracelets, Super East-West Woman hopes to chase away the evil for which each nation blames the other. And at the same time, she manages to poke fun at herself, her two cultures, and the ludicrous situations in which her life, between East and West, has placed her.”

Rhonda Schaller, Gallery Director