MOHAMMAD GHAZALI

Tehran Inclined to the Right
10 May -30 May, 2013

Assar Art Gallery is pleased to present Tehran Inclined to the Right, an exhibition of photographs by Mohammad Ghazali.  Marking the artist’s 3^rd solo show with the gallery, Tehran Inclined to the Right showcases the latest works from an ongoing project that Ghazali has been working on since 2008. 
Focusing on change, as in Iranian Spring, Arab Spring and Prague Spring; instead of photographing the demonstrations post election in 2004, Ghazali strips his photographs of any political connotations and photographs those very same streets, vacant of demonstrators, capturing a collective memory.
In this series, by using instant photos that cannot be manipulated, he encapsulates the conscious vandalism of a city that he believes is moving backwards, is ruined and eaten up.  What’s noteworthy is that while the photos in his previous series, Where the Heads of the Renowned Rest, resemble old Polaroid photos, for this new series, he has actually used expired Polaroid films to further illustrate the sense of oldness he seeks out in his photographs.  Ghazali’s finished works resemble the remnants of history – the history of Tehran as he sees it in a total of 43 Polaroid films of which he has carefully chosen 27 to display.     
Born in 1980 in Tehran, Iran, Mohammad Ghazali received his BA in photography from Tehran’s Azad University in 2004.  In the same year, his work, Self-portrait won him the 1^st place prize at the 9th International Photography Biennial of Tehran, giving him a 3-month research opportunity at the Cite International Des Arts in Paris.  Ever since his first solo show in 2002, he has participated in several national and international group shows and his work has been exposed at Paris Photo, Contemporary Istanbul and Art Moscow.