Shirin Neshat; Born March 26, 1957 (age 62), Qazvin, Iran; Neshat was enrolled in a Catholic boarding school in Tehran. Influenced by western feminism, her father encouraged each of his daughters to "be an individual, to take risks, to learn, to see the world". He sent his daughters as well as his sons to college to receive higher education; In 1975, Neshat left Iran to study art at UC Berkeley and completed her BA, MA and MFA.[14] Neshat graduated from UC Berkeley in 1983, and soon moved to New York City. There she quickly realized that making art wasn't going to be her profession at that time. After meeting her future husband, who ran the Storefront for Art and Architecture, an alternative space in Manhattan, she dedicated 10 years of her life to working with him there, a second education; Neshat was artist in residence at the Wexner Center for the Arts (2000) and at MASS MoCA (2001). In 2004 she was awarded an honorary professorship at the Universität der Künste, Berlin.[33] In 2006 she was awarded The Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize, one of the richest prizes in the arts, given annually to "a man or woman who has made an outstanding contribution to the beauty of the world and to mankind's enjoyment and understanding of life."[34]
In 2010 Neshat was named Artist of the Decade by Huffington Post critic G. Roger Denson, for "the degree to which world events have more than met the artist in making her art chronically relevant to an increasingly global culture," for reflecting "the ideological war being waged between Islam and the secular world over matters of gender, religion, and democracy," and because "the impact of her work far transcends the realms of art in reflecting the most vital and far-reaching struggle to assert human rights."[10]
In 2015 Neshat was selected and photographed by Annie Leibovitz as part of the 43rd Pirelli Calendar which celebrated some of the world's most inspiring women.[35]; At the 2017 Salzburg Festival Neshat directed Giuseppe Verdi's opera Aida, with Riccardo Muti as conductor and Anna Netrebko singing the main character.[36] Asked by the festival organizers about the particular challenge for an Iranian woman to stage a play that deals with the threats of political obedience and religion to private life and love, Neshat said "Sometimes the boundaries between Aida and myself are blurred."; Iranian visual artist who lives in New York City, known primarily for her work in film, video and photography.[5] Her artwork centers on the contrasts between Islam and the West, femininity and masculinity, public life and private life, antiquity and modernity, and bridging the spaces between these subjects.[1][6]
Since Iran has undermined basic human rights, particularly since the Islamic Revolution she has said that she has "gravitated toward making art that is concerned with tyranny, dictatorship, oppression and political injustice. Although I don’t consider myself an activist, I believe my art – regardless of its nature – is an expression of protest, a cry for humanity.”[7]
Neshat has been recognized countless times for her work, from winning the International Award of the XLVIII Venice Biennale in 1999,[8] to winning the Silver Lion for best director at the 66th Venice Film Festival in 2009,[9] to being named Artist of the Decade by Huffington Post critic G. Roger Denson.[10] Neshat is a critic in the photography department at the Yale School of Art