ArchivesSpace at the University of Iowa

Shirin Neshat's powerful and meaningful film was presented at the Chicago Art Institute. It was an installation of two synchronized black and white video sequences projected on large screens on opposite facing walls. In "Rapture," Neshat articulates the ways in which space and spatial boundaries are politicized in Islam. The men populate a stone fortress on one side of the room all wearing black pants and white shirts, and on the other wall the women move in a barren dessert wearing black full-length veils. The message by Neshat is that "both men and women are contained and controlled by a fortress mentality - women behind the veil, men behind the wall." The film was accompanied by music by Sussan Deyhim, blending Middle Eastern and North African folk traditions with contemporary sources using lyrics, abstract primal utterances, natural ambient sounds, electronic noise and percussion. -- Source of annotation: Marvin or Ruth Sackner.