Artist Statement

My practice centers on fiber art, a medium that lets me merge technique with storytelling rooted in my cultural heritage. Textiles embody the duality of women's artistry delicate yet resilient, soft yet powerful.

Grounded in my background in law, my work engages themes of human rights, women's rights, and equality. I use the Cypress (Sarv) and paisley (Botteh) as metaphors for heroic women fighting for freedom in Iran. Through symbols deeply tied to Iranian history, my sculptures reflect transformation, grief, resistance, and strength. I honor paisley’s nomadic of transformation as a symbol of ongoing resistance and evolving hope.

A central paradox in my work is the expectation that women must do everything at once mother, professor, artist, activist.

Through maximal-ism and hyperbolic forms, I highlight this resilience while exposing how women bend under these pressures, often without support. My pieces hold both extraordinary capability and the unsustainable burden within the same visual space. My weaving honors the bravery and hope of generations challenging restrictive beliefs. Each thread becomes a quiet act of protest, an assertion of autonomy, equality, and compassion, echoing a lineage of strength that transcends borders.

The story of The Great Cypress and Paisley

The Cypress is a significant symbol in Iranian history and poetry. Its most important symbolic aspect represents freedom and liberty It’s called Azadeh (liberal) because it is free from the burden of fruit and always green standing upright and free from all attachments. This ancient symbol underwent a remarkable transformation. The beloved Western paisley pattern; known as Boteh Jegheh in Farsi; traces its ancestry to the majestic cypress of Persia. After the Islamic Era, a subtle metamorphosis occurred: in Iranian miniature paintings, the once-rigid cypress began to curve and bend. Over decades, this evolved from blossomed into the paisley motif that graced textiles, architecture, and decorative arts throughout Iran. The pattern journeyed to India through textile trade, and from there spread across the globe.

This narrative deeply inspires me. The pattern's resilience, its ability to travel continents while remaining perpetually relevant, offers a powerful metaphor for understanding women's experiences. Like paisley itself, the design is rotatable, adaptable within any composition, endlessly joinable and reproducible. It bends without breaking, transforms while preserving its essence, and finds strength not in rigid uprightness alone, but in the

grace of flexibility and endurance.