Shadi Ghadirian

Shadi Ghadirian is one of Iran’s leading contemporary photographers. Born in Tehran in 1974, she rose to prominence in the late 1990s and has become a defining voice of her generation. Shaped by the restrictions of post-revolutionary Iran, her provocative and quietly subversive photographs explore the limits of freedom and expression, and a yearning for liberty and a more colourful life.

This expanded second edition traces the full arc of her practice: from the concentrated stillness of the black-and-white Untitled Qajar series, through the vivid still lifes of Nil Nil, to the digitally manipulated Ctrl+Alt+Delete and the prophetic geopolitics of Seven Stones. Across three decades, Ghadirian has navigated the boundaries between personal and public, tradition and modernity, and documentary and fiction.

With subversive charm and wit, she turns her lens on domesticity, authority and everyday life, confirming her place as one of the most original photographers of her time.