ABSTRACT:

This exhibition proposal for the new Pompidou Center to be constructed in Jersey City, New Jersey explores themes of identity throughout the Iranian diaspora with regard to spirituality, collective memory, gender, culture, and post-colonial dissonance. The exhibition aims to facilitate community learning regarding Contemporary Art within Jersey City, and to foster conversations surrounding the essential shift of art historical practice towards decentralizing derivative European modernist movements. This exhibition features 29 Modern and Contemporary works of art in various mediums and focuses on Iran’s significant contributions to Modern Art aesthetics. In line with its title, Qahveh Khaneh (coffeehouse), the show and its programming efforts are geared towards creating a coffeehouse-like atmosphere for patrons, including many aspects and mediums central to the traditional Iranian coffeehouse—a space for political discourse, social and philosophical exchange, endorsement of visual arts, sciences, math, music, and performance, while also acting as a hub for community, and a place for building collective memory.