Biography

At the intersection of conceptual, staged and documentary image-making, Hoda Afshar’s artistic practice explores the representation of gender, marginality and displacement. Initially drawn to the potential of the documentary image to unearth hidden realities, she is equally committed to critiquing the collusion between the photographic medium and hierarchies of power. Informed by her own experience with migration and cultural displacement, Afshar’s work takes the intrusiveness of the camera as a point of departure to unpack the relationship among truth, power and the image while disrupting traditional image-making conventions.

Her work has been the subject of many solo exhibitions, including Speak the Wind, Milani Gallery, Brisbane (2022); Remain, Wagga Wagga Art Gallery, Victoria, Australia (2019); Behold, Perth Centre for Contemporary Photography (2019); Under Western Eyes, Edmund Pearce Gallery, Melbourne (2014); and In-Between Spaces, Krasnodar Institute of Contemporary Art, PhotoVisa International Festival of Photography, Russia (2013). She has also participated in group exhibitions at Aichi Triennial, Japan (2022); Kunst Haus Wien Museum, Vienna (2022); National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne (2021); Lahore Biennale (2020); Beyond Place Museum of Photographic Arts, San Diego (2019); and Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney (2018), among others.

Her publications include Speak the Wind (MACK Publishing, 2021); Just Images, commissioned essay for View Finding (Monash Gallery of Art, 2020); and Reading the Arrival of Demons, dɪˈvan | A Journal of Accounts, Issue #2 (DIVAN JOURNAL and UNSW Art & Design, 2017).

Afshar’s work can be found in numerous private and public collections, including Victoria and Albert Museum, London; National Gallery of Victoria, Art Gallery of NSW; MUMA Collection, Art Gallery of South Australia; and Auckland University Art Collection.

Her awards and fellowships include the Sidney Myer Creative Fellowship (2021); Ramsay Art Prize, Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide (2021); and Career Development Grant, Australian Council for the Arts (2019).

Afshar received a BFA from Azad University of Art and Architecture, Tehran (2006) and a PhD in Creative Arts from Curtin University of Technology, Perth, Australia (2019).

Born in 1983 in Tehran, she currently lives and works in Melbourne.

SAF participation:
Sharjah Biennial 15 (2023)

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