Maryam Safajoo, Seysan, The Land of the Lovers (2024), Oil on linen, 18 x 36 inches

Maryam Safajoo is a Persian-American painter and activist exploring women’s rights, cultural behavior and responses toward violence. She creates narrative paintings illustrating the systematic persecution of the Iranian Baha’i community after the 1979 Iranian revolution. Many of these incidents only exist in the memory of those who experienced them and have no other pictorial representation. These paintings are often the first time these painful events have taken visual form.

Using a journalistic approach, Safajoo interviews people who were near or involved in the actual events depicted. She communicates with family members and community connections in Iran, some of whom are currently imprisoned, to verify every detail before painting. At once deeply personal and political, this artwork seeks to raise awareness about an oppressive situation in another part of the world. As Safajoo says, “the pain of one is the pain of all.