For Iranian director Abbas Kiarostami, the world is defined by an ambiguity that stretches far beyond any one worldview or rigid ideology, instead sharing the elusiveness and subjectivity of a passing glimpse from the window of a speeding car. Here, in the flicker of this unique and ephemeral vision by car and camera – Kiarostami’s definitive style – a poetics and worldview begins to take shape, one belonging exclusively to Kiarostami: neither Eastern Islamist nor Western modernist. Instead, his films explore a transitory existence of roadways and journeys: the non-places of society devoid of political affiliation, populated by ambiguous characters constantly in search of something tangible yet masking questions of a more existential nature – who am I?
In spite of his seeming ambivalence in an increasingly polarized Iranian society, Kiarostami does in fact tacitly offer a political perspective defiant of the censorship and rhetoric of Iran’s theocracy; offering instead a visual expression of the world as he sees it to truly exist, far beyond the narrow frame officially sanctioned by the state. For Kiarostami, this voice is best expressed through his formal and conceptual forging of the automobile and camera into a new cinematic apparatus through which to make manifest the world for the viewer, the filmmaker, and the characters who populate his films alike to experience. Yet Kiarostami does not, by any means, merely champion the relentless march towards modernity practiced by the West as evidenced by his problematizing of the very instruments of modernity through which he speaks. And so, what results is a unique and sometimes beguiling viewpoint on modernity and stasis in modern day Iran explored through this transitory aesthetic of “automobility.”
About the presenterJoseph Kraemer
Kraemer is a filmmaker, media artist and educator. He received his MFA in Film and Media Arts from Temple University. His work has exhibited in festivals, conferences and galleries across the U.S., including Chicago, Los Angeles, Milwaukee, and Philadelphia. His scholarly writings have won numerous awards including First Place in the University Film and Video Association’s Paper Prize for two years running, from 2013-2014. He works professionally as a director, cinematographer, and sound designer.