Dark Matter

source: morehshin

“Dark Matter” is a series of combined, sculptural objects modeled in Maya and 3D printed to form humorous juxtapositions.; The objects chosen for the first series are the objects/things that are forbidden or un-welcome in Iran by the government. The objects that in many other countries people use or own freely but under Iranian government laws (for several reasons) are forbidden or discouraged to use. Owning some of these objects/things (dog, dildo, gun, neck tie, satellite dish, etc.) means going to jail, or getting a fine, or constantly being under the risk of getting arrested or bothered by the moral police. By printing and bringing the virtual 3D into physical existence, I want to simultaneously resist and bring awareness about the power that constantly threatens, discourages, and actively works against the ownership of these items in Iran. No matter how functional, through 3D printing, I am able to re-create and archive a collection of forbidden objects. In a way, the sculptural objects serve as a documentation of lives (my own life included) lived under oppressions and dictatorship. This is the documentation of a history full of red lines drawn in the most private aspect of one’s life.

In addition, I have created a series of virtual and 3D landscapes for each body of objects as a way to position them in an unknown time in history. The environments themselves are combination of both ancient and futuristic looking spaces. By designing ambiguous contexts with the architectural and landscape animations, I create a place between the real and the imagined that aesthetically is hard to place in the past or future. What will happen when you re-contextualize the forbidden? Could inserting the sculptures into another time and space change our relationship to these objects and challenge us to enter an historical dimension of the work? In other words, through positioning the tabooed I want to re-emphasize the dramatic and ironic aspect of forbidden; When looking back in twenty years, how would it feel to re-visit this collection?
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source: morehshin

Morehshin Allahyari is a new media artist, art activist, educator, and cultural curator. She was born and raised in Iran and moved to the United States in 2007. Her practice is grounded in questions of political and cultural contradictions that we face every day. As a citizen of Iran and resident of the United States, she looks for a mutually constitutive relationship of politics, people, and places through the use of digital technologies, narrative, and social practice. Morehshin has been part of numerous national and international exhibitions, festivals, and workshops around the world. She has presented her work and creative research in various conferences and universities including TED conference, Nasher Sculpture Center, Dallas Museum of Art, CAA conference, Open Engagement, Prospectives ’12 International Festival of Digital Art, and Currents New Media Festival, and elsewhere. Her work has been featured in Rhizome, Hyperallergic, Animal New York, Huffington Post, NPR, Parkett Art Magazine, Art Actuel magazine, Neural Magazine, Global Voices Online, BBC Persia, among others. She is currently working on a new series of 3D animations and 3D printing sculptures called “In Mere Spaces All Things Are Side By Side” with focus on the limitations and access to the internet in developing countries, using her adolescence Yahoo chat archive as a point of departure. Morehshin is currently an artist in residence at AUTODESK’s Pier9 Art Program.
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source: grayareaorg

Morehshin Allahyari (born 1985) is a new media artist, art activist, educator, and cultural curator. She was born and raised in Iran and moved to the United States in 2007. Her practice is grounded in questions of political and cultural contradictions that we face every day. As a citizen of Iran and resident of the United States, she looks for a mutually constitutive relationship of politics, people, and places through the use of digital technologies, narrative, and social practice. Morehshin has been part of numerous national and international exhibitions, festivals, and workshops in Europe, Asia, the Middle East, Canada, North and South America.
She has presented her work and creative research in various conferences and universities including TED conference, Nasher Sculpture Center, Dallas Museum of Art, CAA conference, Open Engagement, Prospectives ’12 International Festival of Digital Art, and Currents New Media among others. Her work has been featured in Rhizome, Hyperallergic, Neural, Huffington Post, NPR, Parkett Art Magazine, Art Actuel magazine, BBC Persia and VOA live, among others.
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source: 3dprint

Morehshin Allahyari, born and raised in Iran, moved to the United States in 2007, and that move spurred her to begin a virtual, and often critical, examination of her native land.

Allahyari says the work takes on questions of political and cultural contradictions, and as a citizen of Iran – and now resident of the United States – her take on the relationship of politics, people, and places focuses on “digital technologies, narrative, and social practice.”

“I am fascinated about these complex physical and virtual relationships with a place I once called ‘home,’” Allahyari says.

Her work has been shown at national and international exhibitions, festivals, and workshops in Europe, Asia, the Middle East, and North and South America and been featured in (among other publications) the Huffington Post, NPR, Parkett art magazine, Art Actuel magazine, BBC Persia, and Voice Of America Live.

Her latest projects, a series of 3D animations and 3D printing sculptures called In Mere Spaces All Things Are Side By Side and Dark Matter, are focused on access to the internet in developing countries and act as a challenge to cultural limitations.

Dark Matter is a series of scathing and critical sculptural objects which she models in Maya and 3D prints. Their often humorous juxtapositions highlight ideas forbidden or frowned upon by the current Iranian government. While she says the objects in the collection, while they often seem familiar to an American audience, would draw ire and possibly contravene Iranian laws . Allahyari says the simple act of owning objects or items like a dog, a dildo, a gun, a neck tie, or a satellite dish could result in dire consequences like fines, harassment, or even arrest.

“By printing and bringing the virtual 3D into physical existence, I want to simultaneously resist and bring awareness about the power that constantly threatens, discourages, and actively works against the ownership of these items in Iran,” she says. “Through 3D printing, I am able to re-create and archive a collection of forbidden objects. In a way, the sculptural objects serve as a documentation of lives (my own life included) lived under oppressions and dictatorship. This is the documentation of a history full of red lines drawn in the most private aspect of one’s life.”

Allahyari says her intent was to discover “conceptual and poetic ways to use the technology of 3D printing.” She says Dark Matter allows her to use the printer “as a tool for resistance; a tool for documentation of the lives we’ve lived as Iranians since the 1979 revolution.”

According to the artist, “there is something very beautiful about the possibility of 3D printing forbidden objects as an act of resistance.”