Francesca Romana Pinzari
 / Nuda

Contemporary ArtGilda showcases Francesca Romana Pinzari's NUDA work depicting a niqab made entirely of locks of hair from numerous women, created in 2014 on the occasion of a public group exhibition on the theme of feminicide and violence against women.

Mahsa Amini on September 16, 2022 is arrested by the "morality police" (free translation into Italian from Pharsi) in Tehran because she was improperly wearing the veil as prescribed by Islamic law in Iran. She then dies. According to the Iranian Forensic Organization Mahsa died following surgery done because she had a brain tumor from the age of 8. According to the Western press (what the different media in different Western countries wrote from September 16 to today) Mahsa was shot in the head by the police and as a result of that she died. Since that incident, disturbances have begun in several Iranian cities involving women, youth, university and high school students. Women, life and freedom is one of the slogans of the protests taking place throughout the country. In fact, protests in Iran have been going on for several years against corruption and the carvita but this is a different protest from those made to date. In fact, the heart of the protests now is about the inclusiveness of women. There are mothers and grandmothers who publicly remove their veils but well remember that for years women who do not wear the hijadb or wear it badly have been beaten. The term hijab (Arabic: ﺣﺠﺎب, ḥijāb, pronounced /ħiˈʒæːb/, derived from the root ḥ-j-b, "to make invisible, to conceal from view, to hide, to cover") means any barrier of separation placed in front of a human being, or an object, to remove it from view or isolate it. On Sept. 21, a further incident of violence takes place: Hadith Najafi, only 20 years old, is killed by Iranian security forces near Tehran; she was a symbolic figure of youth protests, attending protest rallies without wearing a headscarf (mandatory for women in the Islamic Republic). The protests continued and intensified: in the evening, protesters split up and regrouped in several parts of the city to disperse police forces. People roam at night on rooftops and from windows shouting Women, Life and Freedom. Protests spread to 84 Iranian cities, and teachers' unions announce widespread strikes. Thus, while "Westerners" support the "right" to humanitarian interference in countries, Khamenei, supreme leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran has declared that anti-government protests are supported by the U.S. and Israel. We at Gilda, exhibiting NUDA by Francesca Romana Pinzari invite you to reflection and to ask how much more needs to be said and done to uphold the freedom and dignity of human beings. Francesca Romana Pinzari has been working for many years on the concepts of female identity and gender violence through sculptures, installations and performances. In fact, The work in question is not recent but made in 2014 precisely on the occasion of a public exhibition against feminicide and violence against women. On the work: The niqab, a veil used by Muslim women to cover the head and face, leaving only a slit for the eyes, is usually black in color and of a fabric heavy enough so that nothing shows through. In this work, the niqab becomes very light: created from women's hair, collected and donated to the artist over the years, braided and worked slowly. The slight outline delineates an immediately recognizable shape that tells us about a custom and cultural symbol of some Middle Eastern countries now widespread in the Western world as well.

The paradox is obvious: the dress that covers the entire body, even the head in deference to an interpretation of a Quranic norm, is composed of the symbol of femininity par excellence: hair. The voids and textures of the work contrast with the infinite heaviness that the garment has taken on socially, politically and religiously.

BIOGRAPHY

Francesca Romana Pinzari was born in Perth, Australia, in 1976. She lives and works in Rome. She works with video, installation, performance, sculpture and painting. Her research starts from the body to talk about physical, cultural, political and religious identity. Concepts such as domestic violence, diversity and cultural roots are addressed with a performative approach that also leads the artist to the creation of sculptural, pictorial or installation artifacts of different nature depending on the exhibition project. Many of his materials he finds by walking in the woods such as thorny shrubs, cicada exoskeletons, snake skins or porcupine quills. In her installations and drawings made of horsehair and her own braided hair, the relationship with the body and the organic becomes immediate, while in the creation of crystals the slow and laborious alchemical ritual she performs in solitude in her workshop is not visible but can be sensed from the precious and unusual material that covers her sculptures. He has been exhibiting his work in solo and group exhibitions both in Italy and abroad since 1999.