Dastan presents a site-specific project by Bita Fayyazi in collaboration with Raana Dehghan, Farbod Elkaee, Nariman Farrokhi, Afshin Sadipour, Sepideh Sakhaie, and Sepideh Zamani, titled “The Dinosaur Lost Her Bearings” at Dastan:Outside/College. This exhibition will open on Friday, 18 December, 2020 –with a preview on Thursday, December 17, and will be on display for public viewing until January 15. Featuring a large-scale installation, this presentation includes a number of ceramic, porcelain, and plaster sculptures and a video screening of the first animated cartoon of a dinosaur, titled “Gertie the Dinosaur”, created by Winsor McCay in 1914. ///
Bita Fayyazi (b. 1962, Tehran) currently lives and works in Tehran. Her multifarious practice incorporates a wide range of media from sculpture to drawing, installation and performance . Ever since she began her artistic practice in mid-1990s, she has been known for her process-oriented collaborations and public art installations that transcend using a single medium and move towards multidimensional works. In addition to running independent public art and collaborative projects, Bita Fayyazi has also participated in many renowned international artistic events. Her works have been featured in the Iranian Pavilion at the 51st Venice Biennale in 2005 and have been exhibited at Espace Louis Vuitton (Paris, 2008 and 2010), the Museum of Modern Art, (Freiburg, 2007) and the Pergamon Museum (Berlin, 2008), among others.
“Dastan:Outside Projects” hosts a series of curated pop-up exhibitions located outside the gallery’s main exhibition spaces (i.e. Dastan’s Basement and Dastan+2), including shows at V-Gallery, Shirin Confectionary, and The Electric Room. The program aims to extend the scope of the gallery outside of its regular venues, featuring exhibitions that mostly involve experimental and non-traditional formats of exhibiting art. Bita Fayyazi’s collaborative project, “The Dinosaur Lost Her Bearings”, a Dastan:Outside project, has been formed during autumn 2020 in an old house located at the intersection of College (Now Hafez) and Bamshad in Tehran.
The museum is the final resting place for the dinosaur, where she can recount her story, from prehistoric days up to the present.
The dinosaur whose reputation outlives its early existence and whose ferocious appearance grants it an indomitable status in monster movies and fantasy literature,has sought shelter in this museum only to find it a transitory venue. Her once aweinspiring body has been shattered into mere shards of earthenware. Lying with her disjointed body parts (head, legs, arms) carried on top of portable stands, it offers the viewer the pleasure of the erformative act of brining the body parts back together.
From above unfurls the undulating neck of the creature. At the center of her fragmented figure, stands a large dining table displaying her eggs ––mostly blemished, flawed, and deformed, and yet preserved for an uncertain future. Her five-meter-long tail is sitting on the floor as if leading a life of its own, singular and menacing. At the far end of the space, there stands some species of trees who outlive the extinction. Beyond that forest there is the White Spider with her mate; Genesis, hope, new life or an upcoming threat. Insects, after all, are the only creatures expected to survive a nuclear holocaust. The atomic mushroom cloud is being cultivated for further use. A dog as a witness to an abandoned crown, a dethroned power.
A child’s headless torso displayed in a presentable fashion to feed our fascination in perdition. Each figure and form resides in a specific point of time in the course of history, they all converge in one place through the artists’ imagination. Standing in this museum, we are invited to the prehistoric, pulled back to the present and projected into the future where signs and traces of contemporary human life can be seen.
Bita Fayyazi wishes to thank Pouya Parsa Magham, Sadegh Kamali, Alireza Kamali, Ojan Sirousi, Arya Tabandehpour, Kaveh Irani, and Hama for their contribution to this project.
No 409, NE of College(Hafez)/Bamshad Intersection, Tehran.Iran///
Artists
