We are proud to announce the release of AFI’s new advocacy report, I Create; I Resist: Iranian Artists on the Frontline of Social Change, created in partnership with Voices Unbound and UC Berkeley School of Law. Ahead of the second anniversary of the death of Mahsa Jina Amini and the outbreak of the Woman, Life, Freedom protest movement in Iran, AFI and VU partnered to develop a comprehensive report detailing the Islamic Republic’s systematic attacks on artists and their crackdown on freedom of expression.
Since September 2022, the Islamic Republic has sought to suppress artistic expression and exert control over influential artists, including through censorship, online surveillance, work bans, celebrity task forces, and punitive measures, including arbitrary arrest and prosecution. The report highlights 15 cases of artists that were prosecuted under vague and overbroad laws related to the dissemination of propaganda, the protection of national security, and the safeguarding of public morality.
The report also features the stories of several Iranian artists and creatives, including Jinoos Taghizadeh, Nazanin Noroozi, Yalda Moaiery, and Art / Culture / Action, emphasizing the human impact of the Islamic Republic’s campaign to restrain expression through violence, censorship, and arbitrary punitive measures.
“I Create; I Resist” is made possible with support from the SDK Foundation for Human Dignity and the Open Society Foundation.
AFI is pleased to feature the work of Iranian visual artist Nazanin Noroozi throughout I Create; I Resist. After the outbreak of the Woman, Life, Freedom protest movement in September 2022 Noroozi collected and categorized thousands of traumatic yet powerful images and videos captured by anonymous Iranians involved in the protests. Her multi-media collage pieces seek to amplify the lived experiences of the protestors by incorporating the images they captured on the ground. Read more about Nazanin and her work here.
