December 2 – December 18, 2016
Opening Reception: Friday, Dec 2, 7pm-10pm
Gallery Hours: Wednesday-Sunday, 12pm-6pm

Rocket Rain borrows its title from the second chapter of the Iran-Iraq War, known in the West as “The War of the Cities”, which Iranians refer to and remember as ???? ????? mooshak-baran: “Rocket Rain.” Initiated by the Iraqi Air Force in 1984, and quickly retaliated by Iran, this was a series of systemic air raids over major cities densely populated by civilians. The artist was born in 1986 during the Rocket Rain of Tehran and currently lives in Los Angeles as a refugee.

The Exhibition was inspired by revisiting the 1985-1986 archives of Iranian Newspaper Kayhan (Cosmos) from the nine months the artist’s mother was pregnant with her, her second child during the war. From the banality of crossword puzzles, published in the wartime newspaper for the “leisure” of those living under the bombs and rockets to the three instances the U.N.General Assembly unanimously voted for the end of the Iran-Iraq War in 1982, 1986 and 1988, the exhibition juxtaposes the different abstractions of war. Drawing from the most intimate to the most generic imagery, Rocket Rain provides a lens through which to grapple with the political landscape of the Iranian nation state, while reflecting on the state of perpetual, imminent war in the U.S.

The images, archives and objects that were visited as research and material in this exhibition were shipped from Tehran, Iran by the artist’s parents during the harshest economic sanctions over the span of three years.

Curated by Vardui Sharapkhanyan, the exhibition runs from December 2 to December 18 and will include public programming. A companion publication with essay contributions by Dan Bustillo, Hrag Vartanian and Gelare Khoshgozaran will be available for purchase.