A wedding in a desert full of war props: Gohar Dashti’s best photograph
‘This is a reproduction of a memory I have from my childhood during the Iran-Iraq war. I went to a wedding and could hear bombs and alarms going off’
I grew up in Ahvaz, a city in Iran that’s close to the border with Iraq, during the Iran-Iraq war of 1980-88. I have a memory of going to a wedding party as a child and hearing bombs and alarms – I didn’t fully understand what was happening, or why the bride looked nervous, but there was a paradoxical feeling of still wanting to spend our time in the happiness of that moment.
This photograph reconstructs that memory. It was shot at a location used for making movies about the war: a huge place in the desert where they have all the necessary props. Getting permission wasn’t easy but I wanted to tell my story there, sketching normal life events – weddings, birthdays, Iranian new year – into a war zone. The series, from 2008, is titled Today’s Life and War, and it reflects my interest in the relationship between war and everyday life. I often explore themes of displacement, survival and human resilience in my work. Creating this series helped me process the emotions and memories of growing up in wartime. Many people who lived through it told me they connected to these images because they show struggle and survival.
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