„There are no homosexuals in Iran!“ was proclaimed by the former president of Iran Mahmood Ahmadinejad in a speech at Columbia University, New York in 2007.
The country though is ranked world’s second in performing sexual change surgeries. With the blessing of Ayatollahs, the Iranian government encourages and subsidizes sex change surgeries in order to keep the country „free of homosexuality“ while homosexuality is still punishable by death.
What is the freedom of women in Islamic countries, what is this freedom for western countries?
„Mahtab“ seeks to discuss the freedom that homosexuals (or rather men diagnosed as transsexuals) crave after sex change operations.
We are questioning the reality of freedom for Transsexuals who are legally recognised as women after the operations and also want the public to realize the different aspects of being a woman under the laws and rules of Islamic countries. We are to pointing out the difference between gender, sexual orientation and gender identity.
We are questioning the reality of freedom for Transsexuals who are legally recognised as women after the operations and also want the public to realize the different aspects of being a woman under the laws and rules of Islamic countries. We are to pointing out the difference between gender, sexual orientation and gender identity.
„Mahtab“ is a traditional Iranian song and is sung in this performance by a female voice to oppose the prohibition that women suffer for singing in public.
Two Iranian women have important roles in this project, and also two men (who are hidden from the public).
Mahtab shows the physical and emotional perceptions of a „changing body“ and approaches a political and social view on Islamic society.
The project Mahtab is composed by five artists of different artistic areas, having Daniel Medeiros Almeida as the choreographer and leader of the group.
We focused our research on the Iranian culture, being influenced by the documentary „Be like others“ by Tanaz Eshaghian.
With Roshanak who is an Iranian dancer at Folkwang University of Arts and Mahaa who is an Iranian Opera singer, also studying at Folkwang, we had long conversations about how to be a female artist living in Iran and what the occidental society is thinking about Iran. We compared experiences with what the media shows us about the Iran.
We did research on the Iranian culture, laws and also traditions of this country, in which after the revolution that ended in 1979, female artists had their voices and art hidden from the public, forced to express themselves in secret or only in front of specific public who was also formed only by females.
That led us to the song Mahtab which in Farsi means „Moonlight“ written by Vigen.
The process began with a choreography inspire by the idea of transgender and what this word means to us. We perceived that the movements had much power and are very sensitive in the same time. We combined the movements with the song and experimented with other material to make the audience feel the political and social questions we asked ourselves during the process.
A political and social view on Islamic society
Freies interdisziplinäres Arbeiten 