Artist: Mahsa Soroudi

Exhibition: 7500 miles

Media: Mixed Media

Gallery: http://www.7500miles.org

Website: https://www.mahsasoroudi.com

Masha Soroudi is an Iranian woman who immigrated with her husband from Iran to Iowa, then Southern California, where she currently resides. Soroudi has a BFA in Visual Communication from Azad Art and Architecture University, Tehran. Although she graduated in 2006, she says she has kept in contact with lots of women she met in school, and has even asked them to be apart of her expositions.

The exhibition 7500 miles is a composition of 35 various pieces of art from many Iranian women. Most of the pieces are depictions of women or have some elements of femininity. There are some abstract paintings that do not seem to convey a clear message, some are blurry photo, some piece with animals in them, there are pictures with multiple people in it. Most of the pieces are paintings, with a range of many different colors.

Through her art, Masha aims to show true Iranian Art to Westerners. One of her goals is to show that Western women and Iranian women face very similar, if not the same issues. Western culture has engraved an idea in their head about Iranian culture and the problems they believe Iranian women face. Soroudi’s exhibition exposes Westerners to art that shows them that we are more alike than we think. A central message that she explores is that women all around the world face the same problems, and this issue is more global than we think.

It is interesting to look at the photos because they seem very modern. Nothing seems too far out or different from art pieces that I would see in a gallery in California. Looking through the art makes me question a lot of things because I don’t quite understand what a lot of them mean. Although the message isn’t entirely clear, i still appreciate it because it challenged me to think and see things differently. I feel like Soroudi achieved what she was trying to with her exhibit because she made me look at art that i wouldn’t normally see and made me feel like i was looking at Western art.