Project description

In 2018, Laurence Rasti asked two of her friends—Shaya, an Iranian trans woman she met in Turkey, and Lena, her next-door neighbor in Geneva—to become the subjects of a long-term project that addresses the depth of gender identity and femininity in particular by combining images with texts in form of interviews. During the course of the project, Lena discovered that she had breast cancer. What had started out on a seemingly basic premise, namely the question as to what is a women, suddenly turned much more complex, challenging and painful, as both protagonists struggled with their bodies to reflect who they felt they were.

Author Biography

Laurence Rasti was born in 1990 to Iranian parents in Switzerland. She obtained a Bachelor in Photography at ECAL – University of Art and Design Lausanne, in 2014, and a Master in Fine Arts at HEAD – Geneva University of Art and Design, in 2019. In her photographs she explores the concepts of identity and beauty. Relying on the dual quality of her cultural background, she looks at Swiss and Iranian cultural codes and conventions from a new angle in order to understand the influence of gender roles in society, but also the consequences of migration or the non-respect of fundamental rights.

www.laurencerasti.ch

Venue

Müllerhaus, Bleicherain 7, 5600 Lenzburg