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我今天想與大家分享的這個故事,是我身為伊朗藝術家,身為一名伊朗女藝術家,身為一名過著流亡生活的伊朗女藝術家所面臨的挑戰。好的,這有它的好處和壞處,壞的一面,政治似乎不會放過像我這樣的人,每位伊朗藝術家或多或少都帶有政治色彩,政治已經定義了我們的生活。如果你生活在伊朗,你會面對審查、騷擾、逮捕、酷刑,有時候,是處決。如果你像我一樣在國外生活,就得面對流亡的人生,面對渴望的痛苦,及與所愛之人和家人分離的痛苦。因此,我們找不到道德、情感、心理和政治空間,來將我們自己與社會責任的現實面分離。
奇怪的是,像我這樣的藝術家,發現自己也處於發聲的位置,成為我同胞的代言人。就算我是,事實上這聲音也進不了我的祖國。然而,像我這樣的人,我們正打著兩個不同方面的戰爭。我們被西方批評,西方對於我們身份的觀點,對於建立在我們身上的形象,對於我們的女性、政治、宗教觀點,我們引以為傲並堅持尊重的一切之批評;同時,我們正在打著另一場戰爭,就是我們的制度,我們的政府,我們殘暴的政府,為了繼續執政所做的每項罪行。我們藝術家的處境都岌岌可危,我們正處於一個危險的位置,我們對政府的秩序構成威脅。
但諷刺的是,這個處境賦予所有藝術家力量,因為我們認為,身為藝術家,對伊朗的文化、政治和社會論述極為重要,我們可以鼓勵、煽動、動員,為我們的人民帶來希望,我們是我們人民的記者,是對外面世界的傳聲者,藝術是我們的武器,文化是一種抵抗形式。有時我會羨慕西方藝術家的表達自由,羨慕他們可以將自己跟政治問題分開這個事實,因為事實上他們只需服務一個觀眾,主要是西方文化。但我也為西方擔憂,因為通常在這個國家,在這個我們擁有的西方世界,文化有成為一種娛樂形式的風險。我們的人民仰賴我們藝術家,文化是超越溝通的。
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以下為系統擷取之英文原文
The story I want to share with you today is my challenge as an Iranian artist, as an Iranian woman artist, as an Iranian woman artist living in exile. Well, it has its pluses and minuses. On the dark side, politics doesn't seem to escape people like me. Every Iranian artist, in one form or another, is political. Politics have defined our lives. If you're living in Iran, you're facing censorship, harassment, arrest, torture -- at times, execution. If you're living outside like me, you're faced with life in exile -- the pain of the longing and the separation from your loved ones and your family. Therefore, we don't find the moral, emotional, psychological and political space to distance ourselves from the reality of social responsibility.
Oddly enough, an artist such as myself finds herself also in the position of being the voice, the speaker of my people, even if I have, indeed, no access to my own country. Also, people like myself, we're fighting two battles on different grounds. We're being critical of the West, the perception of the West about our identity -- about the image that is constructed about us, about our women, about our politics, about our religion. We are there to take pride and insist on respect. And at the same time, we're fighting another battle. That is our regime, our government -- our atrocious government, [that] has done every crime in order to stay in power. Our artists are at risk. We are in a position of danger. We pose a threat to the order of the government.
But ironically, this situation has empowered all of us, because we are considered, as artists, central to the cultural, political, social discourse in Iran. We are there to inspire, to provoke, to mobilize, to bring hope to our people. We are the reporters of our people, and are communicators to the outside world. Art is our weapon. Culture is a form of resistance. I envy sometimes the artists of the West for their freedom of expression -- for the fact that they can distance themselves from the question of politics -- from the fact that they are only serving one audience, mainly the Western culture. But also, I worry about the West, because often in this country, in this Western world that we have, culture risks being a form of entertainment. Our people depend on our artists, and culture is beyond communication.
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我成為一位藝術家的過程,是從一個非常非常私人的領域開始,我不是以對我的國家進行社會評論開始,你們眼前看到的第一張圖片,事實上是我離開伊朗12年後第一次返國後的作品,這是在1979年伊斯蘭革命後,我當時不在伊朗,伊斯蘭革命已在伊朗興起,且已完全將這個國家從波斯文化轉變成伊斯蘭文化,我回國主要是為了與家人團聚,並將我在這個社會上的位置重新做個連結,但我卻發現一個完全意識型態的國家,我再也不認識它了。但越是這樣,我變得越感興趣。當我正面臨個人困境和疑惑時,我開始沉浸於研究伊斯蘭革命,它事實上是如何不可思議地轉變了伊朗女性的生命。我發現伊朗女性這個主題非常有趣,從歷史上看,伊朗女性似乎體現了政治變革。因此,某種程度,藉由研究一位女性,你可以得知這國家的結構和意識形態。
所以我做了一組作品,同時面對自己個人生命中的問題。然而它將我的作品帶進了一個更大的論述,就是殉教的主題,針對那些自願站在對神的愛、信念與暴力、犯罪、殘酷交界處的人的疑問。對我來說,這變得相當重要。然而,我是在一個不尋常的位置朝這個前進。我是個局外人,回到伊朗來尋找我的定位,但我不是處於一個批評政府或伊斯蘭革命意識形態的立場。我逐漸發現自己批評的聲音,這個改變過程進行的很緩慢,我發現了我不知道自己會發現的東西。所以,我的藝術變得稍具批判性,我的刀變得有點尖銳,於是我陷入了流亡生活,我成了一個流浪藝術家,我在摩洛哥、土耳其、墨西哥工作,我到世界各地讓大家真正認識伊朗。
現在我正在拍電影,去年我完成了一部電影,片名為《沒有男人,女人更美》。《沒有男人,女人更美》回顧了歷史,但是我們伊朗另一部份的歷史,影片回顧了1953年,當時美國中情局發動一場政變,推翻了一位民選領導人Mossadegh博士,這本書是由一位伊朗女性Shahrnush Parsipur所寫,這是一本很棒的魔幻寫實主義小說,這本書被禁了,她在獄中關了五年,我很迷這本書,我之所以將它拍成影片,是因為它同時闡述了伊朗傳統的、歷史上的女性問題,這是四名女性的問題,她們全都在尋找一個改變、自由和民主的理想,而伊朗這個國家,同樣的,彷彿是另外一個角色,也努力尋求著一個自由和民主,並獨立於外國干預的理想。
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My journey as an artist started from a very, very personal place. I did not start to make social commentary about my country. The first one that you see in front of you is actually when I first returned to Iran after being separated for a good 12 years. It was after the Islamic Revolution of 1979. While I was absent from Iran, the Islamic Revolution had descended on Iran and had entirely transformed the country from Persian to the Islamic culture. I came mainly to be reunited with my family and to reconnect in a way that I found my place in the society. But instead, I found a country that was totally ideological and that I didn't recognize anymore. More so, I became very interested, as I was facing my own personal dilemmas and questions, I became immersed in the study of the Islamic Revolution -- how, indeed, it had incredibly transformed the lives of Iranian women. I found the subject of Iranian women immensely interesting, in the way the women of Iran, historically, seemed to embody the political transformation. So in a way, by studying a woman, you can read the structure and the ideology of the country.
So I made a group of work that at once faced my own personal questions in life, and yet it brought my work into a larger discourse -- the subject of martyrdom, the question of those who willingly stand in that intersection of love of God, faith, but violence and crime and cruelty. For me, this became incredibly important. And yet, I had an unusual position toward this. I was an outsider who had come back to Iran to find my place, but I was not in a position to be critical of the government or the ideology of the Islamic Revolution. This changed slowly as I found my voice and I discovered things that I didn't know I would discover. So my art became slightly more critical. My knife became a little sharper. And I fell into a life in exile. I am a nomadic artist. I work in Morocco, in Turkey, in Mexico. I go everywhere to make believe it's Iran.
Now I am making films. Last year, I finished a film called "Women Without Men." "Women Without Men" returns to history, but another part of our Iranian history. It goes to 1953 when American CIA exercised a coup and removed a democratically elected leader, Dr. Mossadegh. The book is written by an Iranian woman, Shahrnush Parsipur. It's a magical realist novel. This book is banned, and she spent five years in prison. My obsession with this book, and the reason I made this into a film, is because it at once was addressing the question of being a female -- traditionally, historically in Iran -- and the question of four women who are all looking for an idea of change, freedom and democracy -- while the country of Iran, equally, as if another character, also struggled for an idea of freedom and democracy and independence from the foreign interventions.
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我製作這部電影,因為我覺得這很重要,因為它向西方人述說關於我們這個國家的歷史。大家似乎都記得伊斯蘭革命後的伊朗,伊朗曾是一個世俗社會,我們擁有民主,這個民主被美國政府、英國政府從我們手中偷走。這部影片也是對伊朗人民述說,要求他們回顧自己的歷史,並看看他們在如此伊斯蘭化之前的自己,以我們看世事的方式,以我們演奏音樂的方式,以我們擁有知性生活的方式,最重要的是以我們爭取民主的方式。這事實上是一些從我電影中截取的場景,這是一些政變的場景,我們在Casablanca拍這部電影,重現所有的場景。
這部影片試圖在政治故事和女性故事間找到一個平衡點。身為一個視覺藝術家,事實上我最重要的興趣是創作藝術,讓藝術超越政治、宗教、女權主義問題,並成為一個重要的、永恆的、普及的藝術作品。我面臨的挑戰是,如何做到這一點,如何以一個寓言故事講述政治故事,如何感動你,但也能讓你深思。這些是影片中的一些場景和人物。接著發生了綠色運動,在2009年夏天,我電影上映的時候,示威抗議從德黑蘭街頭開始。
相當諷刺的是,這個我們試圖在電影裡描繪的時期,以及對民主和社會正義的呼籲,現在再次在德黑蘭重演。綠色運動顯然鼓舞了這個世界,它為所有主張基本人權,及為民主奮鬥的伊朗人帶來了很多注意,對我來說,最重要的是女性再次的出現,她們對我來說絕對是鼓舞人心的。如果在伊斯蘭革命中,對這些女性形象的描繪是順從,沒有一點聲音,現在我們在德黑蘭街頭,看到了一個新的女權主義思維。那些女性受過教育、具前瞻思維、非傳統、性開放、無所畏懼,是認真的女權主義者。這些女性和那些年輕男性,團結的伊朗人遍及世界各地,由國內到國外。
然後我發現,為什麼我從伊朗女性身上擷取這麼多靈感,那是因為無論在何種情況下,她們已超越限制,她們在所有方面面對權威,打破所有規則。再一次的,她們證明了自己。我在這裡要說的是,伊朗女性已找到了新的聲音,她們的聲音讓我擁有了自己的聲音。身為一位伊朗女性和伊朗藝術家是莫大的榮幸,即使我目前只能在西方扮演這個角色。
非常感謝。
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I made this film because I felt it's important for it to speak to the Westerners about our history as a country. That all of you seem to remember Iran after the Islamic Revolution. That Iran was once a secular society, and we had democracy, and this democracy was stolen from us by the American government, by the British government. This film also speaks to the Iranian people in asking them to return to their history and look at themselves before they were so Islamicized -- in the way we looked, in the way we played music, in the way had intellectual life. And most of all, in the way that we fought for democracy. These are some of the shots actually from my film. These are some of the images of the coup. And we made this film in Casablanca, recreating all the shots.
This film tried to find a balance between telling a political story, but also a feminine story. Being a visual artist, indeed, I am foremost interested to make art -- to make art that transcends politics, religion, the question of feminism, and become an important, timeless, universal work of art. The challenge I have is how to do that -- how to tell a political story by an allegorical story -- how to move you with your emotions, but also make your mind work. These are some of the images and the characters of the film. Now comes the green movement -- the summer of 2009, as my film is released -- the uprising begins in the streets of Tehran.
What is unbelievably ironic is the period that we tried to depict in the film, the cry for democracy and social justice, repeats itself now again in Tehran. The green movement significantly inspired the world. It brought a lot of attention to all those Iranians who stand for basic human rights and struggle for democracy. What was most significant for me was, once again, the presence of the women. They're absolutely inspirational for me. If in the Islamic Revolution, the images of the woman portrayed were submissive and didn't have a voice, now we saw a new idea of feminism in the streets of Tehran -- women who were educated, forward thinking, non-traditional, sexually open, fearless and seriously feminist. These women and those young men united Iranians across the world, inside and outside.
I then discovered why I take so much inspiration from Iranian women. That, under all circumstances, they have pushed the boundary. They have confronted the authority. They have broken every rule in the smallest and the biggest way. And once again, they proved themselves. I stand here to say that Iranian women have found a new voice, and their voice is giving me my voice. And it's a great honor to be an Iranian woman and an Iranian artist, even if I have to operate in the West only for now.
Thank you so much.