Mandana Moghaddam
Exodus
Exodus, 2012, Mandana Moghaddam
Borrowing the biblical title, Exodus addresses the mass flight of people across the world in the wake of war, poverty, and social injustice. Through images of luggage adrift at sea, the video evokes the sense of being uprooted, losing one’s identity, and having to fight for one’s integrity.
Mandana Moghaddam, born in Tehran in 1962, is an Iranian-Swedish contemporary visual artist whose installation work was most notably exhibited in the 51st Venice Biennale. Following the Iranian Revolution, Moghaddam was granted asylum in Gothenburg, Sweden, where she continues to maintain her studio. Her work, which examines themes such as alienation, communication, and gender, attempts to bridge boundaries, inspire intercultural dialogue, and memorialize oftentimes contentious aspects of Iranian life. mandana-moghaddam.com
This work is part of the Dimensions of Citizenship Transit Screening Lounge, a rest stop under the US Pavilion rotunda that presents citizenship through a lens of movement: migration, transgression, transmission, travel, and mobility.