View allAll Photos Tagged Grounding
OXNARD, Calif. (Mar. 23, 2005)--90' tall ship Irving Johnson lies hard aground, only yards from shore, near the entrance to Channel Islands Harbor, Oxnard, CA. USCG photo by Mike Brodey, USCGAUX.
Grounding: States of Gender
Gita Hashemi
Curated by Soheila Esfahani
Exhibition: January 9 – 29, 2026
Thursday, January 8 from 4–6PM
artLAB Gallery, JLVAC
Reproducing an Iranian woman’s auto-ethnography in a visually-striking immersive installation, Grounding was created over an 8-day livestreamed durational performance in February 2017. Heralding the global #Me-Too movement and the #WomanLifeFreedom uprising in Iran, in this installation Gita Hashemi puts gender-based violence and disparity – in fact, the very construction of gender itself – in sharp focus and places the audience fully immersed in it.
Grounding combines life writing with live writing – what Hashemi calls “embodied writing,” using Persian calligraphy only to break its traditional limits. Rather than transcribing sacred text or classical poetry (formal writing by men and about men) on intimate-sized gilded manuscript paper to be owned, here Hashemi writes and records in public – on her hands and knees and marking her own reactions in red ink thus making the labour and our witnessing of it inseparable from the artwork – on massive scrolls and in colloquial language, a woman’s highly intimate stories, what remains absented from formal discourse. The artist’s original statement reads:
“The narrative has been emerging through conversations between us about how being women has affected our lives . . . Writing the self in a public space is an act of liberation when it reveals what we are trained, co-opted, forced, or acculturated to hide. In talking and then writing about intimately personal and sometimes traumatic experiences, Zahra and I have had to overcome many inhibitions. We entered each other’s lives as witness. Therefore, the process has been not only revealing but healing.”
Grounding addresses the politics of gender in contemporary Iran and beyond:
“This piece started with the dream of a space where writing could fully intertwine with embodied gestures and performative expression to explore the potentials of written word in creating visual-emotional landscapes. While I was dreaming, voices and images from the outside world infiltrated in my dreamscape: There is the man who is now president saying “grab [women] by the pussy” and the over-exposed image of an imported made-up doll standing beside him. There is the campus rapist walking free, and the radio host acquitted of sexual assault. There were Pussy Riot in Russia, masses of women in rallies against rape in India, and Women’s March on Washington. There, is the Islamic State, and here, in the “West,” and around the globe is the state of poverty that increasing numbers of women are pushed into, courtesy of neo-liberalism and politics of austerity.”
Grounding was selected as the monographic exhibition of the year in 2017 by the Ontario Association of Art Galleries. The jury cited the work for “representations of freedom and gender that transgress geographical, political, and cultural boundaries.” It was originally created at Carlton University Art Gallery as part of Open Space Lab, curated by Anna Khimasia.
This installation at the artLAB includes the original scrolls written in 2017. The video combines the footage shot on days 1 and 2 of the livestreamed performance (the first 6 scrolls), played here at 2-20x normal speed.
Exhibition text by Mina Rastgu.
Read the review: “Grounding: States of Gender”: Persian calligraphy documents memoir of womanhood in Iran. Written by Incé Husain. Antler River Media Co-op
With generous support from: Department of Visual Arts, Faculty of Arts & Humanities, Centre for Research on Migration and Ethnic Relations, Department of Languages and Cultures, Department of Gender, Sexuality & Women's Studies.
artLAB Gallery
JL Visual Arts Centre
Western University
London, Ontario, Canada
© 2026; Department of Visual Arts; Western University
Featured on gaileguevara.blogspot.com/
Purchase from JENNIFER KOSTUIK ART GALLERY
Grounding: States of Gender
Gita Hashemi
Curated by Soheila Esfahani
Exhibition: January 9 – 29, 2026
Thursday, January 8 from 4–6PM
artLAB Gallery, JLVAC
Reproducing an Iranian woman’s auto-ethnography in a visually-striking immersive installation, Grounding was created over an 8-day livestreamed durational performance in February 2017. Heralding the global #Me-Too movement and the #WomanLifeFreedom uprising in Iran, in this installation Gita Hashemi puts gender-based violence and disparity – in fact, the very construction of gender itself – in sharp focus and places the audience fully immersed in it.
Grounding combines life writing with live writing – what Hashemi calls “embodied writing,” using Persian calligraphy only to break its traditional limits. Rather than transcribing sacred text or classical poetry (formal writing by men and about men) on intimate-sized gilded manuscript paper to be owned, here Hashemi writes and records in public – on her hands and knees and marking her own reactions in red ink thus making the labour and our witnessing of it inseparable from the artwork – on massive scrolls and in colloquial language, a woman’s highly intimate stories, what remains absented from formal discourse. The artist’s original statement reads:
“The narrative has been emerging through conversations between us about how being women has affected our lives . . . Writing the self in a public space is an act of liberation when it reveals what we are trained, co-opted, forced, or acculturated to hide. In talking and then writing about intimately personal and sometimes traumatic experiences, Zahra and I have had to overcome many inhibitions. We entered each other’s lives as witness. Therefore, the process has been not only revealing but healing.”
Grounding addresses the politics of gender in contemporary Iran and beyond:
“This piece started with the dream of a space where writing could fully intertwine with embodied gestures and performative expression to explore the potentials of written word in creating visual-emotional landscapes. While I was dreaming, voices and images from the outside world infiltrated in my dreamscape: There is the man who is now president saying “grab [women] by the pussy” and the over-exposed image of an imported made-up doll standing beside him. There is the campus rapist walking free, and the radio host acquitted of sexual assault. There were Pussy Riot in Russia, masses of women in rallies against rape in India, and Women’s March on Washington. There, is the Islamic State, and here, in the “West,” and around the globe is the state of poverty that increasing numbers of women are pushed into, courtesy of neo-liberalism and politics of austerity.”
Grounding was selected as the monographic exhibition of the year in 2017 by the Ontario Association of Art Galleries. The jury cited the work for “representations of freedom and gender that transgress geographical, political, and cultural boundaries.” It was originally created at Carlton University Art Gallery as part of Open Space Lab, curated by Anna Khimasia.
This installation at the artLAB includes the original scrolls written in 2017. The video combines the footage shot on days 1 and 2 of the livestreamed performance (the first 6 scrolls), played here at 2-20x normal speed.
Exhibition text by Mina Rastgu.
Read the review: “Grounding: States of Gender”: Persian calligraphy documents memoir of womanhood in Iran. Written by Incé Husain. Antler River Media Co-op
With generous support from: Department of Visual Arts, Faculty of Arts & Humanities, Centre for Research on Migration and Ethnic Relations, Department of Languages and Cultures, Department of Gender, Sexuality & Women's Studies.
artLAB Gallery
JL Visual Arts Centre
Western University
London, Ontario, Canada
© 2026; Department of Visual Arts; Western University
Grounding: States of Gender
Gita Hashemi
Curated by Soheila Esfahani
Exhibition: January 9 – 29, 2026
Thursday, January 8 from 4–6PM
artLAB Gallery, JLVAC
Reproducing an Iranian woman’s auto-ethnography in a visually-striking immersive installation, Grounding was created over an 8-day livestreamed durational performance in February 2017. Heralding the global #Me-Too movement and the #WomanLifeFreedom uprising in Iran, in this installation Gita Hashemi puts gender-based violence and disparity – in fact, the very construction of gender itself – in sharp focus and places the audience fully immersed in it.
Grounding combines life writing with live writing – what Hashemi calls “embodied writing,” using Persian calligraphy only to break its traditional limits. Rather than transcribing sacred text or classical poetry (formal writing by men and about men) on intimate-sized gilded manuscript paper to be owned, here Hashemi writes and records in public – on her hands and knees and marking her own reactions in red ink thus making the labour and our witnessing of it inseparable from the artwork – on massive scrolls and in colloquial language, a woman’s highly intimate stories, what remains absented from formal discourse. The artist’s original statement reads:
“The narrative has been emerging through conversations between us about how being women has affected our lives . . . Writing the self in a public space is an act of liberation when it reveals what we are trained, co-opted, forced, or acculturated to hide. In talking and then writing about intimately personal and sometimes traumatic experiences, Zahra and I have had to overcome many inhibitions. We entered each other’s lives as witness. Therefore, the process has been not only revealing but healing.”
Grounding addresses the politics of gender in contemporary Iran and beyond:
“This piece started with the dream of a space where writing could fully intertwine with embodied gestures and performative expression to explore the potentials of written word in creating visual-emotional landscapes. While I was dreaming, voices and images from the outside world infiltrated in my dreamscape: There is the man who is now president saying “grab [women] by the pussy” and the over-exposed image of an imported made-up doll standing beside him. There is the campus rapist walking free, and the radio host acquitted of sexual assault. There were Pussy Riot in Russia, masses of women in rallies against rape in India, and Women’s March on Washington. There, is the Islamic State, and here, in the “West,” and around the globe is the state of poverty that increasing numbers of women are pushed into, courtesy of neo-liberalism and politics of austerity.”
Grounding was selected as the monographic exhibition of the year in 2017 by the Ontario Association of Art Galleries. The jury cited the work for “representations of freedom and gender that transgress geographical, political, and cultural boundaries.” It was originally created at Carlton University Art Gallery as part of Open Space Lab, curated by Anna Khimasia.
This installation at the artLAB includes the original scrolls written in 2017. The video combines the footage shot on days 1 and 2 of the livestreamed performance (the first 6 scrolls), played here at 2-20x normal speed.
Exhibition text by Mina Rastgu.
Read the review: “Grounding: States of Gender”: Persian calligraphy documents memoir of womanhood in Iran. Written by Incé Husain. Antler River Media Co-op
With generous support from: Department of Visual Arts, Faculty of Arts & Humanities, Centre for Research on Migration and Ethnic Relations, Department of Languages and Cultures, Department of Gender, Sexuality & Women's Studies.
artLAB Gallery
JL Visual Arts Centre
Western University
London, Ontario, Canada
© 2026; Department of Visual Arts; Western University
Grounding: States of Gender
Gita Hashemi
Curated by Soheila Esfahani
Exhibition: January 9 – 29, 2026
Thursday, January 8 from 4–6PM
artLAB Gallery, JLVAC
Reproducing an Iranian woman’s auto-ethnography in a visually-striking immersive installation, Grounding was created over an 8-day livestreamed durational performance in February 2017. Heralding the global #Me-Too movement and the #WomanLifeFreedom uprising in Iran, in this installation Gita Hashemi puts gender-based violence and disparity – in fact, the very construction of gender itself – in sharp focus and places the audience fully immersed in it.
Grounding combines life writing with live writing – what Hashemi calls “embodied writing,” using Persian calligraphy only to break its traditional limits. Rather than transcribing sacred text or classical poetry (formal writing by men and about men) on intimate-sized gilded manuscript paper to be owned, here Hashemi writes and records in public – on her hands and knees and marking her own reactions in red ink thus making the labour and our witnessing of it inseparable from the artwork – on massive scrolls and in colloquial language, a woman’s highly intimate stories, what remains absented from formal discourse. The artist’s original statement reads:
“The narrative has been emerging through conversations between us about how being women has affected our lives . . . Writing the self in a public space is an act of liberation when it reveals what we are trained, co-opted, forced, or acculturated to hide. In talking and then writing about intimately personal and sometimes traumatic experiences, Zahra and I have had to overcome many inhibitions. We entered each other’s lives as witness. Therefore, the process has been not only revealing but healing.”
Grounding addresses the politics of gender in contemporary Iran and beyond:
“This piece started with the dream of a space where writing could fully intertwine with embodied gestures and performative expression to explore the potentials of written word in creating visual-emotional landscapes. While I was dreaming, voices and images from the outside world infiltrated in my dreamscape: There is the man who is now president saying “grab [women] by the pussy” and the over-exposed image of an imported made-up doll standing beside him. There is the campus rapist walking free, and the radio host acquitted of sexual assault. There were Pussy Riot in Russia, masses of women in rallies against rape in India, and Women’s March on Washington. There, is the Islamic State, and here, in the “West,” and around the globe is the state of poverty that increasing numbers of women are pushed into, courtesy of neo-liberalism and politics of austerity.”
Grounding was selected as the monographic exhibition of the year in 2017 by the Ontario Association of Art Galleries. The jury cited the work for “representations of freedom and gender that transgress geographical, political, and cultural boundaries.” It was originally created at Carlton University Art Gallery as part of Open Space Lab, curated by Anna Khimasia.
This installation at the artLAB includes the original scrolls written in 2017. The video combines the footage shot on days 1 and 2 of the livestreamed performance (the first 6 scrolls), played here at 2-20x normal speed.
Exhibition text by Mina Rastgu.
Read the review: “Grounding: States of Gender”: Persian calligraphy documents memoir of womanhood in Iran. Written by Incé Husain. Antler River Media Co-op
With generous support from: Department of Visual Arts, Faculty of Arts & Humanities, Centre for Research on Migration and Ethnic Relations, Department of Languages and Cultures, Department of Gender, Sexuality & Women's Studies.
artLAB Gallery
JL Visual Arts Centre
Western University
London, Ontario, Canada
© 2026; Department of Visual Arts; Western University
The crabapple tree by my apartment flowered, covering the parking lot with white petals that looked like snow. 24 hours later, they were all shriveled and grey.
A series of photos showing the effort to remove the Sarah Spencer from her grounding near the Southwestern Sales dock in Windsor Ontario.
Grounding: States of Gender
Gita Hashemi
Curated by Soheila Esfahani
Exhibition: January 9 – 29, 2026
Thursday, January 8 from 4–6PM
artLAB Gallery, JLVAC
Reproducing an Iranian woman’s auto-ethnography in a visually-striking immersive installation, Grounding was created over an 8-day livestreamed durational performance in February 2017. Heralding the global #Me-Too movement and the #WomanLifeFreedom uprising in Iran, in this installation Gita Hashemi puts gender-based violence and disparity – in fact, the very construction of gender itself – in sharp focus and places the audience fully immersed in it.
Grounding combines life writing with live writing – what Hashemi calls “embodied writing,” using Persian calligraphy only to break its traditional limits. Rather than transcribing sacred text or classical poetry (formal writing by men and about men) on intimate-sized gilded manuscript paper to be owned, here Hashemi writes and records in public – on her hands and knees and marking her own reactions in red ink thus making the labour and our witnessing of it inseparable from the artwork – on massive scrolls and in colloquial language, a woman’s highly intimate stories, what remains absented from formal discourse. The artist’s original statement reads:
“The narrative has been emerging through conversations between us about how being women has affected our lives . . . Writing the self in a public space is an act of liberation when it reveals what we are trained, co-opted, forced, or acculturated to hide. In talking and then writing about intimately personal and sometimes traumatic experiences, Zahra and I have had to overcome many inhibitions. We entered each other’s lives as witness. Therefore, the process has been not only revealing but healing.”
Grounding addresses the politics of gender in contemporary Iran and beyond:
“This piece started with the dream of a space where writing could fully intertwine with embodied gestures and performative expression to explore the potentials of written word in creating visual-emotional landscapes. While I was dreaming, voices and images from the outside world infiltrated in my dreamscape: There is the man who is now president saying “grab [women] by the pussy” and the over-exposed image of an imported made-up doll standing beside him. There is the campus rapist walking free, and the radio host acquitted of sexual assault. There were Pussy Riot in Russia, masses of women in rallies against rape in India, and Women’s March on Washington. There, is the Islamic State, and here, in the “West,” and around the globe is the state of poverty that increasing numbers of women are pushed into, courtesy of neo-liberalism and politics of austerity.”
Grounding was selected as the monographic exhibition of the year in 2017 by the Ontario Association of Art Galleries. The jury cited the work for “representations of freedom and gender that transgress geographical, political, and cultural boundaries.” It was originally created at Carlton University Art Gallery as part of Open Space Lab, curated by Anna Khimasia.
This installation at the artLAB includes the original scrolls written in 2017. The video combines the footage shot on days 1 and 2 of the livestreamed performance (the first 6 scrolls), played here at 2-20x normal speed.
Exhibition text by Mina Rastgu.
Read the review: “Grounding: States of Gender”: Persian calligraphy documents memoir of womanhood in Iran. Written by Incé Husain. Antler River Media Co-op
With generous support from: Department of Visual Arts, Faculty of Arts & Humanities, Centre for Research on Migration and Ethnic Relations, Department of Languages and Cultures, Department of Gender, Sexuality & Women's Studies.
artLAB Gallery
JL Visual Arts Centre
Western University
London, Ontario, Canada
© 2026; Department of Visual Arts; Western University
Rendering of post-security room.
The 1,000-square-foot space, in Newark’s new Terminal A located prior to airport security, features sensory activities designed for neurodivergent travelers and travelers on the autism spectrum who want a break from the hustle and bustle of air travel. The Port Authority designed the room with the architecture and design firm PGAL and the Anderson Center for Autism, which certified the space and provided training to terminal staff. The agency also is working on a second complementary sensory room in the same terminal, past security, that will serve as a bookend for a smooth and stress-free airport journey for individuals and families who may need a grounding space.
Series 2 XBee Radio (ZB Pro firmware) in Arduino XBee Shield. The Arduino uses the code.google.com/p/xbee-arduino/ library to send and receive packets with the XBee radio
A series of photos showing the effort to remove the Sarah Spencer from her grounding near the Southwestern Sales dock in Windsor Ontario.
Grounding: States of Gender
Gita Hashemi
Curated by Soheila Esfahani
Exhibition: January 9 – 29, 2026
Thursday, January 8 from 4–6PM
artLAB Gallery, JLVAC
Reproducing an Iranian woman’s auto-ethnography in a visually-striking immersive installation, Grounding was created over an 8-day livestreamed durational performance in February 2017. Heralding the global #Me-Too movement and the #WomanLifeFreedom uprising in Iran, in this installation Gita Hashemi puts gender-based violence and disparity – in fact, the very construction of gender itself – in sharp focus and places the audience fully immersed in it.
Grounding combines life writing with live writing – what Hashemi calls “embodied writing,” using Persian calligraphy only to break its traditional limits. Rather than transcribing sacred text or classical poetry (formal writing by men and about men) on intimate-sized gilded manuscript paper to be owned, here Hashemi writes and records in public – on her hands and knees and marking her own reactions in red ink thus making the labour and our witnessing of it inseparable from the artwork – on massive scrolls and in colloquial language, a woman’s highly intimate stories, what remains absented from formal discourse. The artist’s original statement reads:
“The narrative has been emerging through conversations between us about how being women has affected our lives . . . Writing the self in a public space is an act of liberation when it reveals what we are trained, co-opted, forced, or acculturated to hide. In talking and then writing about intimately personal and sometimes traumatic experiences, Zahra and I have had to overcome many inhibitions. We entered each other’s lives as witness. Therefore, the process has been not only revealing but healing.”
Grounding addresses the politics of gender in contemporary Iran and beyond:
“This piece started with the dream of a space where writing could fully intertwine with embodied gestures and performative expression to explore the potentials of written word in creating visual-emotional landscapes. While I was dreaming, voices and images from the outside world infiltrated in my dreamscape: There is the man who is now president saying “grab [women] by the pussy” and the over-exposed image of an imported made-up doll standing beside him. There is the campus rapist walking free, and the radio host acquitted of sexual assault. There were Pussy Riot in Russia, masses of women in rallies against rape in India, and Women’s March on Washington. There, is the Islamic State, and here, in the “West,” and around the globe is the state of poverty that increasing numbers of women are pushed into, courtesy of neo-liberalism and politics of austerity.”
Grounding was selected as the monographic exhibition of the year in 2017 by the Ontario Association of Art Galleries. The jury cited the work for “representations of freedom and gender that transgress geographical, political, and cultural boundaries.” It was originally created at Carlton University Art Gallery as part of Open Space Lab, curated by Anna Khimasia.
This installation at the artLAB includes the original scrolls written in 2017. The video combines the footage shot on days 1 and 2 of the livestreamed performance (the first 6 scrolls), played here at 2-20x normal speed.
Exhibition text by Mina Rastgu.
Read the review: “Grounding: States of Gender”: Persian calligraphy documents memoir of womanhood in Iran. Written by Incé Husain. Antler River Media Co-op
With generous support from: Department of Visual Arts, Faculty of Arts & Humanities, Centre for Research on Migration and Ethnic Relations, Department of Languages and Cultures, Department of Gender, Sexuality & Women's Studies.
artLAB Gallery
JL Visual Arts Centre
Western University
London, Ontario, Canada
© 2026; Department of Visual Arts; Western University
I wanted good contact between the battery tray and the grounding plate, so I left the areas where they touch unprimed.
As original patent holder for Chem-Rod grounding rod, LEC is a trailblazer in grounding solutions. Our product has become a grounding protection standard. Grounding rod protection systems can prevent dangerous accidents that may occur due to short circuits or very high voltage from a lightning strike. Contact us, Lightning Eliminator & Consultants Inc., today and get a lightning protection system properly installed: www.lightningprotection.com/
Grounding: States of Gender
Gita Hashemi
Curated by Soheila Esfahani
Exhibition: January 9 – 29, 2026
Thursday, January 8 from 4–6PM
artLAB Gallery, JLVAC
Reproducing an Iranian woman’s auto-ethnography in a visually-striking immersive installation, Grounding was created over an 8-day livestreamed durational performance in February 2017. Heralding the global #Me-Too movement and the #WomanLifeFreedom uprising in Iran, in this installation Gita Hashemi puts gender-based violence and disparity – in fact, the very construction of gender itself – in sharp focus and places the audience fully immersed in it.
Grounding combines life writing with live writing – what Hashemi calls “embodied writing,” using Persian calligraphy only to break its traditional limits. Rather than transcribing sacred text or classical poetry (formal writing by men and about men) on intimate-sized gilded manuscript paper to be owned, here Hashemi writes and records in public – on her hands and knees and marking her own reactions in red ink thus making the labour and our witnessing of it inseparable from the artwork – on massive scrolls and in colloquial language, a woman’s highly intimate stories, what remains absented from formal discourse. The artist’s original statement reads:
“The narrative has been emerging through conversations between us about how being women has affected our lives . . . Writing the self in a public space is an act of liberation when it reveals what we are trained, co-opted, forced, or acculturated to hide. In talking and then writing about intimately personal and sometimes traumatic experiences, Zahra and I have had to overcome many inhibitions. We entered each other’s lives as witness. Therefore, the process has been not only revealing but healing.”
Grounding addresses the politics of gender in contemporary Iran and beyond:
“This piece started with the dream of a space where writing could fully intertwine with embodied gestures and performative expression to explore the potentials of written word in creating visual-emotional landscapes. While I was dreaming, voices and images from the outside world infiltrated in my dreamscape: There is the man who is now president saying “grab [women] by the pussy” and the over-exposed image of an imported made-up doll standing beside him. There is the campus rapist walking free, and the radio host acquitted of sexual assault. There were Pussy Riot in Russia, masses of women in rallies against rape in India, and Women’s March on Washington. There, is the Islamic State, and here, in the “West,” and around the globe is the state of poverty that increasing numbers of women are pushed into, courtesy of neo-liberalism and politics of austerity.”
Grounding was selected as the monographic exhibition of the year in 2017 by the Ontario Association of Art Galleries. The jury cited the work for “representations of freedom and gender that transgress geographical, political, and cultural boundaries.” It was originally created at Carlton University Art Gallery as part of Open Space Lab, curated by Anna Khimasia.
This installation at the artLAB includes the original scrolls written in 2017. The video combines the footage shot on days 1 and 2 of the livestreamed performance (the first 6 scrolls), played here at 2-20x normal speed.
Exhibition text by Mina Rastgu.
Read the review: “Grounding: States of Gender”: Persian calligraphy documents memoir of womanhood in Iran. Written by Incé Husain. Antler River Media Co-op
With generous support from: Department of Visual Arts, Faculty of Arts & Humanities, Centre for Research on Migration and Ethnic Relations, Department of Languages and Cultures, Department of Gender, Sexuality & Women's Studies.
artLAB Gallery
JL Visual Arts Centre
Western University
London, Ontario, Canada
© 2026; Department of Visual Arts; Western University
The heavy wire top right is not a grounding wire as I previously thought. I had it connected to the old copper pipe and with the new stuff disconnected and wrapped the bare end. The wire in fact was grounding a minute current and measured 83 volts. Somewhere in the wall or ceiling this wire is contacting something hot because with it disconnected I could feel a low grade sizzle when touching the cone nut directly in back of my shower handle when adjusting it one night while standing in the water on the bath tub floor.
.
The next two shots show my temp remedy which now reads only .3 volts from the cone nut to the drain.
Featured on gaileguevara.blogspot.com/
Purchase from JENNIFER KOSTUIK ART GALLERY
Grounding: States of Gender
Gita Hashemi
Curated by Soheila Esfahani
Exhibition: January 9 – 29, 2026
Thursday, January 8 from 4–6PM
artLAB Gallery, JLVAC
Reproducing an Iranian woman’s auto-ethnography in a visually-striking immersive installation, Grounding was created over an 8-day livestreamed durational performance in February 2017. Heralding the global #Me-Too movement and the #WomanLifeFreedom uprising in Iran, in this installation Gita Hashemi puts gender-based violence and disparity – in fact, the very construction of gender itself – in sharp focus and places the audience fully immersed in it.
Grounding combines life writing with live writing – what Hashemi calls “embodied writing,” using Persian calligraphy only to break its traditional limits. Rather than transcribing sacred text or classical poetry (formal writing by men and about men) on intimate-sized gilded manuscript paper to be owned, here Hashemi writes and records in public – on her hands and knees and marking her own reactions in red ink thus making the labour and our witnessing of it inseparable from the artwork – on massive scrolls and in colloquial language, a woman’s highly intimate stories, what remains absented from formal discourse. The artist’s original statement reads:
“The narrative has been emerging through conversations between us about how being women has affected our lives . . . Writing the self in a public space is an act of liberation when it reveals what we are trained, co-opted, forced, or acculturated to hide. In talking and then writing about intimately personal and sometimes traumatic experiences, Zahra and I have had to overcome many inhibitions. We entered each other’s lives as witness. Therefore, the process has been not only revealing but healing.”
Grounding addresses the politics of gender in contemporary Iran and beyond:
“This piece started with the dream of a space where writing could fully intertwine with embodied gestures and performative expression to explore the potentials of written word in creating visual-emotional landscapes. While I was dreaming, voices and images from the outside world infiltrated in my dreamscape: There is the man who is now president saying “grab [women] by the pussy” and the over-exposed image of an imported made-up doll standing beside him. There is the campus rapist walking free, and the radio host acquitted of sexual assault. There were Pussy Riot in Russia, masses of women in rallies against rape in India, and Women’s March on Washington. There, is the Islamic State, and here, in the “West,” and around the globe is the state of poverty that increasing numbers of women are pushed into, courtesy of neo-liberalism and politics of austerity.”
Grounding was selected as the monographic exhibition of the year in 2017 by the Ontario Association of Art Galleries. The jury cited the work for “representations of freedom and gender that transgress geographical, political, and cultural boundaries.” It was originally created at Carlton University Art Gallery as part of Open Space Lab, curated by Anna Khimasia.
This installation at the artLAB includes the original scrolls written in 2017. The video combines the footage shot on days 1 and 2 of the livestreamed performance (the first 6 scrolls), played here at 2-20x normal speed.
Exhibition text by Mina Rastgu.
Read the review: “Grounding: States of Gender”: Persian calligraphy documents memoir of womanhood in Iran. Written by Incé Husain. Antler River Media Co-op
With generous support from: Department of Visual Arts, Faculty of Arts & Humanities, Centre for Research on Migration and Ethnic Relations, Department of Languages and Cultures, Department of Gender, Sexuality & Women's Studies.
artLAB Gallery
JL Visual Arts Centre
Western University
London, Ontario, Canada
© 2026; Department of Visual Arts; Western University
Brady Poppinga argued for intentional grounding and he got his call! Officials know that The Brady, He Does Not Lie.
Grounding: States of Gender
Gita Hashemi
Curated by Soheila Esfahani
Exhibition: January 9 – 29, 2026
Thursday, January 8 from 4–6PM
artLAB Gallery, JLVAC
Reproducing an Iranian woman’s auto-ethnography in a visually-striking immersive installation, Grounding was created over an 8-day livestreamed durational performance in February 2017. Heralding the global #Me-Too movement and the #WomanLifeFreedom uprising in Iran, in this installation Gita Hashemi puts gender-based violence and disparity – in fact, the very construction of gender itself – in sharp focus and places the audience fully immersed in it.
Grounding combines life writing with live writing – what Hashemi calls “embodied writing,” using Persian calligraphy only to break its traditional limits. Rather than transcribing sacred text or classical poetry (formal writing by men and about men) on intimate-sized gilded manuscript paper to be owned, here Hashemi writes and records in public – on her hands and knees and marking her own reactions in red ink thus making the labour and our witnessing of it inseparable from the artwork – on massive scrolls and in colloquial language, a woman’s highly intimate stories, what remains absented from formal discourse. The artist’s original statement reads:
“The narrative has been emerging through conversations between us about how being women has affected our lives . . . Writing the self in a public space is an act of liberation when it reveals what we are trained, co-opted, forced, or acculturated to hide. In talking and then writing about intimately personal and sometimes traumatic experiences, Zahra and I have had to overcome many inhibitions. We entered each other’s lives as witness. Therefore, the process has been not only revealing but healing.”
Grounding addresses the politics of gender in contemporary Iran and beyond:
“This piece started with the dream of a space where writing could fully intertwine with embodied gestures and performative expression to explore the potentials of written word in creating visual-emotional landscapes. While I was dreaming, voices and images from the outside world infiltrated in my dreamscape: There is the man who is now president saying “grab [women] by the pussy” and the over-exposed image of an imported made-up doll standing beside him. There is the campus rapist walking free, and the radio host acquitted of sexual assault. There were Pussy Riot in Russia, masses of women in rallies against rape in India, and Women’s March on Washington. There, is the Islamic State, and here, in the “West,” and around the globe is the state of poverty that increasing numbers of women are pushed into, courtesy of neo-liberalism and politics of austerity.”
Grounding was selected as the monographic exhibition of the year in 2017 by the Ontario Association of Art Galleries. The jury cited the work for “representations of freedom and gender that transgress geographical, political, and cultural boundaries.” It was originally created at Carlton University Art Gallery as part of Open Space Lab, curated by Anna Khimasia.
This installation at the artLAB includes the original scrolls written in 2017. The video combines the footage shot on days 1 and 2 of the livestreamed performance (the first 6 scrolls), played here at 2-20x normal speed.
Exhibition text by Mina Rastgu.
Read the review: “Grounding: States of Gender”: Persian calligraphy documents memoir of womanhood in Iran. Written by Incé Husain. Antler River Media Co-op
With generous support from: Department of Visual Arts, Faculty of Arts & Humanities, Centre for Research on Migration and Ethnic Relations, Department of Languages and Cultures, Department of Gender, Sexuality & Women's Studies.
artLAB Gallery
JL Visual Arts Centre
Western University
London, Ontario, Canada
© 2026; Department of Visual Arts; Western University