Statement:
Gilan: the Story of a Year
Gilan read her alleys to my ears line by line, in her voice of the rain hitting the galvanized roofs, like an unread and dear book. There I could still see those rows that chained the gloomy autumns and winters of Gilan. Unlike today’s cities, that land was damp. Her people were not hidden behind iron or curtains: they were visible, and their visibility had turned them to naive. As if surrendered to their destiny, they were spread on the roofs like rugs, not expecting any news. In such a place, I was like a war-struck who –tired of years of homelessness- took refuge in a border where they spread the flavor of rice and the scent of river. My wandering in this border brought about photos whose concern is neither to document the topography nor to boast the geography nor even to record the ethnography. To me, Gilan is not a place with some determined geographical features; it is rather a possibility where I can let my mind flow. For this reason, these photos are most of the times my personal interpretation of the beyond, mingled with my favourite forms in photography, and an attempt to find the nature of space and the invisible relationships between the few people inside my frames and things and the environment. Exposing the photos in this exhibition is merely what I owe to Gilan, for the year I spent there teaching. There I feel like a kid learning a new dialect, so, please read these photos with the accent of the rain.