Statement:

I search for that elusive it that gets eliminated from one’s life when a person has been subjected to trauma over long stretches of time. I grew up in southern Iran and moved to the US immediately following my 21st birthday in 1995, so these notions are very personal to me. Something happens to you when you see someone be torn to pieces in an air raid. When you grow up queer, but you occasionally hear that a queer person has been hanged for no crime other than being queer.  When you are ten years old, and you wake up one morning to the news that the cousin you were close to has died in a chemical warfare attack. When you are thirteen years old, and you get punched in the face fighting over bread after waiting in line for three hours in 130-degree heat.  But until not too long ago I wasn’t even aware that I needed to talk about these concepts. In the passing moments when I did consider talking about my traumatic experiences, I quickly talked myself out of doing so. I told myself that the emotions accompanying my thoughts were melancholic stupidity that didn’t deserve recognition. And that experience felt like threading a needle in darkness, a darkness that was swallowing my voice, something akin to screaming under water.  A continuum of darkness had filled the outside, the inside, and the space that separated the two. But the space that separated the outside and the inside is where it had lived. Where it and I had lived. Where we had stayed for years, waiting to find a way to come inside, to leave the margins of reality and materialize, to acquire shape. And the shape we acquired was that of scribblings on large sheets of papers. Of steel rods somewhat resembling words. Words to replace what it is like to scream. Words to emulate keeping quiet. Words to represent pain. Words resembling the things we brought. The things we left behind. The shape of words that were written, of animals that were harmed, the words that were not meant to be read, the animals who were rescued, of cups and ashtrays that sit gathering dust, of walkways, of parks, of playgrounds where terrifying things had happened, of pottery wheels, and little plants that grow out of clay pots just before they are put in the kiln, of people cooking,  of my mother at home, of old music, of huddling together and gossiping, of watching my mother age, of my youngest sister being the oldest person in the world, of surviving.  Art is not a luxury when you search for that of which you’ve been robbed.

Some people know Ramin as a mathematician, or a musician (and a member of the Middle East Music Ensemble).

Complete CV available upon request.

rtakloo@gmail.com

About

Ramin Takloo-Bighash (b. 1974, Sarbandar, Iran) is a Chicago-based multi-disciplinary artist. In his work, Ramin explores immigration, war, trauma, isolation, and imprisonment—experiences that are very personal to him. Ramin is an immigrant, and even though he has lived more than half of his life in the US there is a part of his that still feels like a person in exile.  A basic question that Ramin grapples within in his practice is: what happens to language in the face of trauma? Persian calligraphy, and its, often wordless, incarnations in painting, sculpture, and cartography, forms the core of Ramin’s artistic practice. Other than calligraphy, painting, and sculpture, Ramin’s practice also includes writing, music, photography, and film. His most recent film is “It happened down the street” which he made based on a visit to southern Iran in the summer of 2022.

Brief CV:

Education:

·       MFA in Art, University of Illinois at Chicago, May 2023. 
        Advisor: Beate Geissler 
        Thesis committee: Christopher Grimes, Norma Moruzzi, Jennifer Reeder

Select shows: 

·       Agitator Animation, February 2024.
·       Movement Studies: Screen Test, Roman Susan Art Foundation, October 2023.
·       Works on Paper Group Show at Agitator, October 2023.
·       Art for Life Chicago (juried art auction to benefit people living with HIV/AIDS), October 2023.
·       5th Annual Side/Lot Experimental Video Showcase, Evanston Art Center, September 2023.
·       2023 Evanston + Vicinity Biennial, Evanston Art Center, August-October 2023.
·       Have you eaten? Group show at Agitator, July 2023.
·       Reflections of Resilience, Group show at HAZ Cooperative Studios, June 2023.
·       Home, Not Home, Group show by AnySquared at Agitator, June 2023.   
·       MFA thesis show, Gallery 400, UIC, March 2023. 
·       Group show at Agitator to celebrate the re-opening of the space, September 2022. 
·       Human Rights Event, by CIRCA Pintig, Chicago, IL, December 2021. 
·       Collaboration with Ashley Dequilla on EL SUENYO AMERIKANO, Intersect Gallery at Mana Contemporary, Chicago, IL, November 2021. 
·       And Then: Stories of What Happens Next, Group Show, Agitator Gallery, Chicago, October 2020.  
      The Art of Teaching, Group Show, The Icehouse Gallery, Evanston, January 2020.
·       Captured, Sculpted, Written, Solo Pop-up Show, Agitator Gallery, October 2019.
·       Aerograd, Multimedia Performance with Da Niche, Maria Dimanshtein, and Galina Shevchenko, The Icehouse Gallery, October 2019.  
·       The Evanston-made Group Show, The Evanston Art Center, April 2019. 

RECENT AWARDS:

·       Three for life (together with Samantha Haring and Jeff Cote), Art For Life Chicago 2023, October 2023. 

Publications:

·       There was once a guy, a novel. MFA thesis, University of Illinois at Chicago, May 2023.   
·       And Then: Stories of What Happens Next, contributing artist, ed. Gretchen Hasse, published by Agitator Gallery, October 2020. 
·       Laughing in the Burning House, Poems by Shahram Sheydayi, translated to English by Amy Grupp and Ramin Takloo-Bighash, Kalagh-e Sefid, Tehran, December 2017.

Presentations:

·      Trauma in Contemporary Persian Literature, Didaar Art Collective, Virtual Event, Chicago, December 2020. 
·      There was once a guy: A novel, Didaar Art Collective, Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, September 2019. 
·      The democratic structures of the constitution of the Islamic Republic of Iran: A cautionary tale, The Persian Circle, University of Chicago, March 2017. 
·      The Poetry of Shahram Sheydayi, The Persian Circle, University of Chicago, April 2012. 

Sample Activities:

·       Executive Board, The Musical Offering, Evanston, IL, since 2019. 
·       The Middle East Music Ensemble, University of Chicago, Percussion, since 2008. 
·       Shalizar Ensemble, Principal Voice and Percussion, 2012-2017. 
·       Poetry night, a monthly Persian meetup, co-organized with Azadeh Khastoo, Chicago, 2008-2011. 
·       Vice President and Director of Cultural Programs, The Iranian American Cultural Society of Maryland, 2003-2007. 
·      Co-organizer, The Tea Party, A Monthly Lecture Event, Baltimore, IL 2003-2007.

Teaching:

·      Contemporary Iranian Poetry (Post WWII), Advanced Undergraduate Course, Dept of Near Eastern Studies, Princeton University, Spring 2007.